


Sugarland

by ms_qualia



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Fake Dating, Fluff, Reyux, actual fluff I swear to God, bed sharing, secondary stormpilot, ski trip
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-16
Updated: 2016-07-30
Packaged: 2018-07-24 11:08:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7505986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ms_qualia/pseuds/ms_qualia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey is invited on a ski vacation by Poe so she can be there when he proposes to his boyfriend.  Too bad it's couples-only and she has to share a room with Armitage Hux.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Poe's birthday was in full swing by the time Rey arrived, offering of ice in arms. It was one of those late fall nights where other people's barbeques drifted across the neighborhood before the first cold snap hit. A chilly wind caressed Rey's arms as she stood in line for snacks. There were too many people and the music was too loud, but there wasn't a person who knew Poe who'd miss it. He had that effect on people.

People showed out for Poe's costume birthday parties. This year Rey was dressed up as an alien, full antenna, green grease-pained face, googly eyes glued on her cheeks.

Someone tapped her shoulder. She turned to see Finn cutting in line in front of her, dressed like something from some anime. He had a spiky blond wig, headband, and orange jumpsuit. He took the ice from her, sat it on the table, and gave her a huge hug.

"Heyyyyy," she said.

He pulled away to look her up and down. "Oh, man, look at you!"

"You too! You're Naruto?"

"Of _course_. Where've you been? Whatchu up to?" he said.

"Ugh, work. I can't be here long."

"Whaaaat? No. It's Sunday tomorrow. That means no work."

"You'd think!" she said.

"Are they giving you any days off?"

"Just comp time. The other guy in my department quit and they're dragging ass on the interviews."

"That sucks."

"... Anyway, how've you been?"

"Uh, amazing. And you're here, so amazing-er." That melted Rey's heart a little. They made stupid faces at one another until Finn turned his attention to the ice and dumping it into the neediest ice chest full of beer. Rey pulled a beer out for herself and unscrewed it.

Rey looked around to see if she could find Poe and finally spotted him by the stereo. He was in a toga and spray painted golden laurels and flip-flops, talking to some tall guy in a snow-white military coat and hat.

Rey didn't know him. She had seen him at other parties on and off for a few years but not with any kind of regularity. They might have played a board game once or something, she wasn't sure. Poe was older than Rey and Finn, and this guy looked closer to Poe's age than Rey's. He was tall and redheaded and stood board-straight. He held his tumbler in the other hand like Rey imagined silver screen movie stars might, his hand perched over the top like a spider on a web. He was talking to Poe.

"Who is that guy?" Rey asked Finn. She knocked back a deviled egg she swiped off the buffet.

Finn made a face. "That's, uh, Hux. He's kind of... well, you see him. Rigid."

"How's he know Ben?"

"I think they're military buddies?"

" _Poe_ was in the military?" He seemed completely not the type, and was into men besides.

"Yeah! He was a pilot. He didn't tell you?"

"No."

"Huh. Anyway, I don't think Hux is in the Airforce. I don't know how they met."

Across the crowd the redheaded man's eyes caught hers, and Rey looked away hurriedly. She glanced back at Poe, who also looked over. He waved. Rey showed him all of her teeth and waved back. Poe, black haired and Hux redheaded glanced at one another and started pushing their way through the people. Hux strode like nervous clockwork.

Rey didn't _dislike_ the military. There were levels upon levels she didn't get it. The machismo of it, the stated values of patriotism and loyalty all hit Rey's ears like off-key music. That wasn't a fact she liked to share. It was like admitting to not understanding goodness itself if she said it to the wrong crowd. People who liked and understood the appeal of the military really liked it and didn't seem to have any paitence for Rey's ambivalence.

She said, attempting something positive, "Well, he looks fresh out of...." she failed. "...wherever."

"Be nice," hissed Finn as Poe and the man approached.

Poe gave Rey a huge 'hello' hug. He pivoted away and she was face to face with the tall man, who lifted his chin away from her and peered down shoulders rolled back. Standoffish.

"Hi," said Rey. He didn't react and Rey was over it immediately. She turned to see Finn and Poe's hug had escalated into horseplay. Poe had lifted Finn up onto his toes and dropped him suddenly when Finn pinched his ribs.

Poe exclaimed, "Aaaa, you motherfucker!"

"Oh my God," Rey muttered.

"Hey," said Poe letting go of Finn to start going after Rey, but he caught sight of Hux, standing a little off to the side, Rey faced right-angles to him and crossed arms. Poe said, "Hey, have you met Armie?"

"Huh?" said Rey.

"Hux," said Hux.

"Armie Hux," said Poe.

"Hux," Hux reasserted.

"Sure," Poe said absently. "This guy... this guy's a good guy. This is Rey, she's awesome. You guys should talk or something." He beamed at Rey. She tightened her lips over her teeth and turned to Hux.

"So um... what do you do?" she said.

"I was an officer in the Navy," he said. "I was discharged on Friday."

Poe held his eyebrows up and pointed at him, selling him like a product. "This guy went to Iraq. And Germany. I think you were in Germany the last three years?"

Hux nodded.

Rey tried to think of something. "Do you speak German?"

He said, "Ich spreche ein bisschen Deutsch. Sprichst du Deutsch?"

Rey stared at him. "I, uh...."

He exhaled sharply. "I speak it a little bit."

"I see that."

He gave a little half-bow. "Excuse me." Hux walked off suddenly. Poe shot Rey an apologetic smile and trotted after him.

"Rey," said Finn.

"What?"

* * *

The party melted into clumps of people dancing sloppily. Poe rounded up a few members of the party and dragged them into his bedroom for clandestine Cards Against Humanity.

"Are you sneaking out of your own party?" she teased.

"What? I don't know everyone. It's my birthday! I do what I want."

They all sat on the floor with the exception of Hux, who perched on the edge of the bed like he might catch germs off of the bedspread. Poe dealt the cards and twisted around to hand Hux some.

Hux held his hand up, refusing. "I haven't played."

"Oooooh," said Poe, grinning. "Just watch a round. I'm judging this one."

It was her, Poe, Finn, Hux, and a couple other people Rey didn't know well. The first card was "Next time on Dr. Phil: How to talk about ______."

Rey sorted through her cards and placed hers face-down on top of the pile. Poe got to it first and snorted.

"I mean, this one wins," he said. He cleared his throat and said "'Next time on Dr. Phil: How to talk about the primal, ball-slapping sex your parents are having right now.'"

Finn, crestfallen, said, "What about ''doin' it in the butt'?"

Poe replied, "What _about_ doin' it in the butt?"

"Did you even consider it?"

"I, I mean—"

"My card, doofus."

Poe sorted through the cards and found Finn's submission. "I-I have to say, Finn's very convincing Rey. I need a tie breaker. You got anything to offer me?"

Rey sorted her remaining cards, shook her head. "No butt stuff."

"Hux, what do you think? Butt stuff or your parents fucking?" Poe leaned back and genially gave Hux a smile. Hux was sitting, stiff and bright red. Poe continued. "Okay, we broke Hux. Butt stuff it is!"

They dealt Hux in the next few rounds. As his cup drained and the game went on, the invisible broom handle up his ass retracted a little. He took his hat off and placed it on his lap, He had bright red hair, cut tight above his ears and with the longer bits smoothed back with pomade. Rey, a little drunker than she had been, found his cheekbones interesting. He wasn't bad looking. Pretty eyes. He caught her looking at him and didn't look away for a while. Rey felt compelled to say something.

"You, uh... what kind of uniform is that?"

"Full dress whites," he said. "The Navy," he added.

"It's a costume?"

"They're...." he pursed his lips. "...my nice clothes. I don't have a costume."

"Oh. Well, I don't own Navy... anything," she said lamely. "Or anything nice. These are my fanciest googly eyes." She shook her head for emphasis and felt a dozen little plastic disks rattle on her face.

The corners of his mouth turned down so they would not turn up. 

"They suit you," he said.

" _Yo_ ," said Poe to Rey.

"Hm? Oh, my turn!" Rey put down 'micropenises.' Always a hit.

Hux finally won a round and permitted himself a small smile when Poe clapped him on the shin.

In her pocket, Rey's phone chimed. "Aaaah, I gotta go," she said.

"Whaaat?" said Poe.

"Yeah, work."

"Shit."

"Yeah, I'll talk to you."

"Let me walk you to your car?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah."

This was the cue for the game to break up. The others filed out. Rey looked over her shoulder to see Hux, by himself, perched on the edge of Poe's bed as Poe walked her out.

"Thanks for coming."

"I wish I could be here longer."

"Yeah. Listen, thanks for like, talking to him?"

"Hux? Uh, yeah. I didn't say a lot?"

"More than anyone else. Like, getting back to civilian life is a little... it's weird. He had some medical thing and they discharged him before he really wanted to get out. He's not really used to like, civilians? So yeah, like, thanks."

"I just talked to a dude, man."

"Yeah." Poe opened her car door for her. She gave him a hug.

"He'll be staying a few weeks until he has a place. Come over maybe after work?"

"I'm working."

Poe showed his teeth to her, eyebrows raised. "You're working after work?"

"Probably," she said miserably.

"Tell 'em to fuck themselves. Come see me. I've got like this ski trip I wanna do."

"Ski trip?"

"Yeah, yeah. I want you to come. You got vacation time?"

Snow. She had never actually seen snow in person.

The spreadsheet with Rey's comp time flashed before her eyes. She groaned. "I do."

"Take it?"

"Poe...."

"It's my birthday," he said. He held his arms out wide, corraling her into looking into his eyes. His brown, unfair, puppy dog eyes. Even when he was obviously up to no good, Rey had trouble saying no to him.

"It's not gonna be your birthday when we go."

"I'm gonna propose."

"What? To Finn?"

They'd been together for five years. Gay marriage was legal. Rey didn't know why she was surprised. Finn was her age. People her age doing something so adult didn't sound right.

"Yeah," said Poe. "I'd like you and Hux to be there when I ask. Please?"

Rey rubbed her face. "Fine, fine, fine. Fine."

"Excellent!"

* * *

Her work took a month to hire someone and another to train her up. Rey and Finn had grown up together, but since he'd met Poe she'd gotten pretty close to both. Three peas in a pod. Since Finn worked different shifts than she did, Poe was easier to get ahold of to plan the trip out. The moment Rey's trainee could handle a shift by herself, Rey put in a request to use some comp time.

Rey was going skiing.

Poe had gotten a pretty good deal. November first through the fifth, eight-hour car ride away. Some place called Sugarland up a mountain.

Rey wasn't so sure about skiing. It sounded suspiciously like exercise. Rey did exercise the way she brushed her teeth. She'd never thought to build a weekend around either activity.

But there would be snow.

* * *

It was chilly late morning when Rey parked her car ass-to-ass end with Finn's and transferred her bag and second-hand snow boots to his car.

"Brought your swimsuit?" Poe asked.

"Mmm hmm."

Hux shambled out of the house in a white button-up shirt and slacks. He was carrying a small leather satchel.

"I'm so glad you guys could come," said Finn.

Hux grunted.

Poe said, "Honey, did you get the sunscreen?"

Finn said, "The what?"

"You might need sunscreen."

Finn looked down at the backs of his hands and up at Poe, eyes full of sarcasm.

"... I might need it. And you know where stuff is."

"I'll get it," Finn said testily. Poe watched him go in and pulled a box out of his pocket. There was a plain gold ring inside.

"Very nice," said Rey. Hux nodded.

Poe beamed. He shoved the box back in his pocket. "Look, uh, I didn't tell you guys something?"

"Hm?" said Hux.

"This, uh, weekend is kind of for couples? They do these early season discounts for couples. So, I, uh, told Finn you guys were together."

Hux drew his head back. "I _beg_ your pardon?"

Hux had shaved that morning. Rey could smell his shaving lotion. She'd had half a weird conversation with him at a party once, and some of it had been in freaking German. Rey managed, after a long moment, to squeak out a betrayed, "... _Why_?"

"They _really_ don't like people taking discounts meant for couples at the resort. Finn's got no poker face."

The storm door smacked shut behind Poe and he glanced over his shoulder. Finn held up the sunscreen stick and Poe gave him a sheepish grin as he walked over. Poe whispered. " _Please_ , guys. It'd mean so much if you were there."

Rey and Hux looked at one another in muted terror at Finn bopped Poe on the nose with his sunscreen and gave him a kiss. Finn turned to Rey and Hux and said, "It's so cool you guys got together."

"Eh?" said Rey.

Finn said, "I mean, like, you're my best friend. Hux is Poe's, and now we're all together. Plus you guys are seriously cute. I mean, neither of you are like, super huggy types, but you could tell you just had this instant thing."

Poe nodded and grinned desperately. "Yeah. So cute."

His eyes begged her and Hux to go with it. They pled. Big, brown eyes.

Rey could crush the whole thing right then. Disappoint Finn. Get Poe in trouble. Miss out on snow. Miss out on seeing Poe get on one knee. Rey could have cried. She glanced over at Hux, stiff and stone-faced. He blinked slowly and looked into her eyes.

Something brushed her hand. She looked down. Hux's fingers fumbled for hers, and there they were, palm to palm, fingers laced together. A tall, stiff man with great cheekbones and long, cool fingers.

Finn gushed, "Oh my gosh, look at her. You're red!"

"We're not used to being demonstrative," Hux said.

"Who talks like that?" muttered Rey. The tips of Hux's ears turned red.

Poe laughed and stepped between them, pulling their hands apart. He laughed nervously. "Oh-ho-ho, man, you guys are _too_ _much_!"

He corraled a stunned Rey and Hux into the back seat and floored it out of there before either of them could recover from their shock.

Hux watched the scenery go by, white shirt unbuttoned to the collarbone, jaw clenching and unclenching. He glanced over at her and she looked away, suddenly out of breath.

There was no way she could pull this off. Absolutely no way. He was eerily quiet and he was a stranger and he was socially kind of weird, with a background Rey didn't understand at all. And Poe wanted her to pretend they were dating. Rey glanced back at him again. He was lost in thought. He stared out the car window, biting his full, pink lower lip. She felt herself turn red.

Rey was going to _murder_ Poe.


	2. Chapter 2

Eight hours in a car was a long time.  As they drove north they hit an incoming cold front, and the wind buffeted their car.  When Poe stopped for gas they dug their winter coats out of the back.  Finn had thought to bring a little wool blanket as well and cuddled up contentedly.  Everyone else quietly resented him as they warmed their fingertips between their knees.

Rey put on her headphones listened to music for a while.  Poe's car crested a high hill.

"Oh, wow," said Finn.  Hux folded his book over his finger and looked to see what Finn had seen, so Rey followed his gaze.

They had arrived at wind farm country.

Rey took hear headphones out of her ears so she could give it her full attention.  The landscape talked to them.   Its voice dipped down to a valley and up an set of autumn amber rolling hills with giant whooshing white turbines for its punctuation.  The clouds cast blooming shadows across everything laid out below.  The four of them were in were one of four cars Rey could count on the two-way road that wound its way down and far and away, fine as thread across the crest of the next hill.  

As they drew close to one of the turbines, Rey understood what she had merely inferred from seeing them from far away: they were massive.  Each was tall as any building in her hometown, and they whooshed with a steady heartbeat-like thrum.

Human hands had built that and at least a hundred more.  Rey's mind balked at the scale.  She let it fuck with her head as she looked from identical turbine to identical turbine.  She squinted closely as they drew close to the first one they would pass and saw a set of rungs with a wire cage running up its side.

"Oh!" she said.  "You can _climb_ them?"

"For maintenance," said Hux.

"Huh," said Rey, uninterested.  She was lost in the idea of the view from up on top of it.  

Rey's job was spreadsheets and accounts payable and aching knuckles from data entry.  A climb like that, looking out over the valley the little car had descended into was by comparison a kind of magic. Rey imagined who she'd be and how she'd feel if she could conquer a climb like that.  She wondered what it looked like from the top of one of a hundred spinning giants.

"How do they keep from falling?" asked Finn.

Hux said, "There's something like a mountain-climbing rig.  You don't free climb."

"You been up one of those?" asked Poe.

"Not a wind turbine.  I have been up a radio tower about that high.  You can see for miles."

Rey said, "Really?"

"Oh, man, I'd have pissed myself," said Poe.

Hux said, "... You were a _pilot_."

Poe shook his head.  "It's different, man.  Your craft is like your own body.  Like, you don't worry you might fall off of your legs, you don't worry about your plane.  A ladder might just... jump out under you.  Spooky."

Hux rolled his eyes and looked out the window.

Finn said, "I wonder how many people they employ?  How many people's lives revolve around just... making this happen."

"Fewer than you might think," said Hux.  "If it's a well-organized operation and you manage your time well, you can—"

 _Of course_  Hux had found the least interesting possible thing to say about it.  Rey interrupted pointedly, "That's not even the cool part."

"Oh?" said Hux, bristling.

She said, "I wonder what it looks like from up there?"

Hux looked her up and down.  "I suppose you'll never know."

And _there_ was the machismo she'd been looking for.  It couldn't hide forever.  She said,  "Why not?  I could make the climb."

She waited for him to contradict her.  Instead, he said.  "No doubt you could.  But the work it takes to actually do it would bore you" he said.  Rey winced.  He said, "Would you like me to tell you what it's like?"

"Hey now," said Poe cheerfully.  There was a little edge to his voice.  He looked at Hux and Rey through his rear view mirror.

Rey rubbed the blood back into her face.  She put her headphones back in and tried not to imagine the world from atop those lovely white waving giants.

 

* * *

 

Rey jerked awake as the car door opened, face hot and neck cramped.  She looked around for the source of the chill air.

It was after dark.  They were parked in a little half-empty lot.  They had arrived.

"Nn?" she said.  Hux, stretching his legs outside of the car, turned around.  Finn was still in the passenger seat.  Poe was trotting away from the car up a set of wooden steps toward a log cabin-like building with huge windows and a high-steepled roof, lit up like a beacon in the night.  Rey turned and peered around Hux, who was stretching his legs.  She looked for the mountain.

There was impenetrable blackness illuminated by the light streaming out of the lodge.  There were rocks, mulch, dirt, and a stand of firs off down the road they must have driven through, and nothing else.  No stars or moon.  A cloudy night.

No snow.

Rey focused back on Hux, bent in front of her, and looked at him with immense and aching disappointment.  He screwed his face up as if it had been directed solely at him.

"We're here, _honey_ ," he said.  His lips curled into a thin sneer.  Exactly what Rey didn't need.

"'Honey'?" said Finn.  "Oh my gosh, you call her 'honey'?"

"Y-you should hear what I call him," said Rey.  "But I think he'd be embarrassed."

"No, no." Hux said.  "Let's hear it."

"Okay. _Pumpkin_." Rey said to Finn,  "'Cause he's red, you see."

"Orange," corrected Hux.

"No.  No, I meant red."

"You guys are so funny," said Finn sleepily.

The pair traded electric dirty looks until Hux tired of it and jogged off to the lodge after Poe. Finn, in the front seat, pulled his knit blanket tighter around his shoulders and beamed at her.

"This is so nice," he said. "All of us together."

"W-why do you like us together so much?  I mean, me and Hux."

"Aw, you know.  I'm just kind of a sucker for this stuff."

"Oh? Uh... why?"

"I don't know.  Like, you haven't had the easiest life.  He hasn't.  You're both kinda— no offense— you're prickly.  But even you guys, you know?  I mean, I know it's just been a month, and I was really wary at first because if you broke up it'd make things so weird but... I don't know, it grew on me the more I thought about it.  I'm really rooting for you two.  You both deserve to be happy."

"Oh.  Well, I don't know, there's more to being happy than some guy."

Finn silently agreed, but then spotted something out his window and his eyebrows moved upward, just a little.  Rey could see the tips of his teeth under his lips as they parted.  When she followed his look she saw Poe walking back to the car, grinning like the love-struck idiot he was.  Finn rolled the window down.  Poe pecked him on the nose.

"Cabins are all ready," said Poe.

"Cabins?" said Rey.  

"Yeah.  We're staying in cabins."

Finn mumbled sleepily, "Oh, cool."

Rey looked for Hux and spotted him pacing and red-faced on the main lodge's walkways, trying to work a cell phone and failing.  Rey pulled her own out.  No reception.  She looked back up at Hux.  He looked like he might scream.  Finn only had eyes for Poe and did not notice.

Rey said, "What's up with him?"

"He, uh... thought there'd be more rooms?" said Poe.

Rey froze.  "... Whaddya mean, _Poe_?"

"Uh, we uh... only have one cabin each.  And they're one room.  Each."

Finn said, pulling his blanket tight around him around him as he got out of the car, "That's not a problem, right?"

Rey looked at Poe's pleading eyes.  For now, she would save him.  _But later_ , her eyes said, _murder_.

"We've... we're taking it slow?" said Rey.

Finn understood.  "Ooooh.  Oh."  His eyes darted.  Rey imagined ghosts of Rey's sex history past flashing before Finn's eyes.  He said, "Wait, really?"

"We're, uh, trying to get it right.  You know."

"Oh!  Oh, gotcha.  That's good!  That's a good change for you."  Finn said without a trace of malice.  

Rey wondered what the fuck that meant.  

Finn turned to Poe.  "But like, that's really awkward, sweetie.  You should have asked."

Poe said, "I didn't know!  Anyway, dinner?"

 _Murder_.

Rey stepped blearily out of the car.  No snow, mulch on a steep incline, and an overcast sky.  Brown and gray and miserable.  But it was cold.  Very cold.  Rey crossed her arms.  There was a very thick forest way off behind the lodge, the pines casting strange shadows behind them into the deep woods.  Hux, calmer, strode down to meet them as Rey surveyed the situation and started to cope.  

She attempted to say something nice.  "This is...." started Rey.

"— A dump," finished Hux.  He towered over Poe, looking down at him.  Poe leaned back.  "This is a ski resort, you said?"

" _Hey_ ," said Poe.  "There was supposed to be snow yesterday."

Hux theatrically opened his arms to the glory of nature and looked around at all the snow there wasn't.

Finn stepped in, "That's right, we can't really ski right now.  But isn't there other stuff, sweetheart?"

Poe said, " _Yeah_ , in fact.  There is.  There's a big indoor pool.  They've got hot baths, saunas.  There are hiking trails.  They do activities during the day.  And it _will_ probably snow."

Finn said, grabbing Poe's hand and looking in his eyes, "So we're going to have a great time?"

Poe's lower lip started to wibble.  "Yeah."

Finn looked at Rey and Hux, eyes hooded.  "We're just tired from the drive.  We need something to eat and maybe we'll rest up after.  Right?"

It was a tone that allowed for no argument.  Rey and Hux, in unison, sighed their resignation.

 

* * *

 

"What do you mean?" Hux said to the silvered-haired woman at the front desk.  She and he locked steely looks.

"Just what I said.  Dinner is at six.  You missed it."

Hux said, "What do you do when people need to eat after six?"

"We don't do anything.  It's in the brochure."

"What happens if someone is diabetic?"

"Are you diabetic?" the receptionist asked.

"No."

"We remind them dinner is at six," she said with the confidence of a woman who knew the nearest town was an hour and a half away.

Rey sighed.  "Do you sell snacks?"

"In the gift shop," said the woman.

"Finn, do we still have sandwiches?"

Finn had spaced out at the arguing, blanket wrapped around his shoulders.  "Hm?  Yeah."

Rey looked around for Poe.  He had disappeared.  "Hey, where'd Poe go?"

Hux snapped away from the woman and looked around.

The woman pointed. "Your friend headed off toward the gift shop."

Finn wandered off in that direction.  Hux watched him go.

"I'll sleep in the car," Hux said lowly.

"Okay," said Rey.

"No you won't," said the front desk woman.  Hux frowned at her.

"This is private," he said.

The receptionist said, "It's gonna be ten below tonight."

" _That_ cold?" said Rey.

"It's fine," said Hux.

The receptionist shook her head adamantly.  "Nope.  Not in my parking lot.  I catch you in your car in this cold, I'm calling a ranger and you can sleep wherever he hauls you off to."

"Madam—"

"I ain't a 'madam.'  I have half a mind to kick you out now for this drama but I gave you and your friend the Servicemember discount, so thank you for your service.  Your friend has your cabin key, go get you a snack."

Rey felt a stab of anger at the woman.  "H-hey—" said Rey.

Hux's fingers splayed at his side to hush Rey and she bit her tongue.  His face was bright white.  His eyebrows crept up his face carefully.

Rey had a strong reaction and tried to pinpoint what it was about. She didn't feel afraid of him like he might do anything rash.

She felt bad for him, she realized.   Misery upon misery upon misery weighed him down over the last eight hours, and now this condescending lady was the final leaden weight piled on an already weighed-down man.

He was weird and kind of a dick, but he didn't deserve this.

Impulse overtook Rey and she grabbed his hand.  A little gasp of air hissed in through his lips.

"Hey, man," said Rey.  He turned his head, chin up, and looked down at her, ashen.  Rey glanced toward the gift shop.

Slowly, the color crept back into his face  His eyes were not-quite-green with pale lashes.  His eyes traveled over her face, up and down, up and down.  Lips, eyes, hair, back to eyes.  The fight left him.  His fingers loosened, attempting to re-adust his grip, but she leaned back away from him.

Her ring and pinky fingers were locked with his, and neither dared to move.  Not toward, not away.  They stood half-tangled and mostly breathless.

"Um, uh, let's find the boys," she said.

"I apologize for what I said the car," he said.

"It's fine."

"No.  I mean it."

"Okay.  Okay, yeah."  Rey felt some of the fight leave her as well as his narrow shoulders slumped.  "Me too."

Finn exclaimed, "Oh my gosh!"  Rey and Finn yanked their hands back to their sides and turned to see him.  "Oh no, don't stop," he said.

"We're just not..." Rey tried to think of a word.  "... demonstrative?"

Hux's eye slid around to catch hers.  "Comfortable," he said.

"Yeah," Rey said.

"Yet," Hux said.

Poe flitted out of the gift shop, holding up chips and candy.  "Look what I got us!"

"Is it edible?" asked Hux.  He caught a bag of chips Poe tossed him.

"You're eating it, so sure."

Hux tightened his lips at him.

"How'd you two meet?" said Rey.

"College roommates!" said Poe.

"Oh." Rey said.  "And that's how you're friends?"

Hux pointed an accusing finger.  "He wouldn't stop talking to me."

"You wouldn't talk to me _at all_.  I had to wear you down.  It was important."

Hux blew air out of his nose.

Poe grinned.  "And now he's my best friend besides Finn in the world, so it was worth it."

Hux froze.  "I am?"

Poe glanced at Finn and Rey for a second, as if suddenly aware he was with people and of his own showman-like body language.  He dropped his eyes for a moment, and the expression slipped off his face like he was taking off a mask.

"I mean, yeah," he said.

Hux looked to the side, at the other two people.  He said, "I'm glad I came."

"Good."

Finn and Rey looked at one another, aware they had stepped in on a moment that they had no business being anywhere near.  Rey cleared her throat.

"So, uh, dinner?" she said.

 

* * *

 

They ate leftover sandwiches and junk food in the lobby of the lodge next to the fireplace.  It burned low, the embers red and flecked black.  Rey sat on the mantle with her back to it, and let it bake out the aches of the car ride.  Hux sat next to her, leg crossed over his knee.  He was a little closer than she liked, but a little farther than a boyfriend might sit, so she didn't dare scoot away for fear Finn would catch it.  To Hux's credit, he didn't look at her or do anything to make it weirder.

After dinner, they played hearts with a pack of cards Finn had thought to bring.  They had to teach Rey, but Hux and Poe were good.  Rey had trouble remembering the rules.  Poe kept stopping in the middle of the rules to rhapsodize about how Hearts, in its truest form, was about strategy and betrayal.  He kept forgetting to tell her what to do with the damn cards.  Hux ran through it once, clipped and to the point, but it was a list of about ten things to keep track of.  Rey was quickly lost.

She put down the wrong suit on a hand and frowned as Hux penalized her on the napkin he used to keep tally.

"How do you remember all this?" she asked.

Poe said, "You get stuck on a base in the middle of nowhere, you learn every card game there is."

" _All_ of them," confirmed Hux grimly.

"Why don't you go somewhere?"

Hux and Poe snorted as if Rey had told a joke.  Finn volunteered, "I don't think they got to do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted.  It was just to pass the time."

Hux touched his nose silently as he made eye contact with Finn, perfect competitive poker face unbroken.  _Bingo_.

Rey shuddered at the thought of being told what to do and having to obey while she rearranged the cards in her hand.  She and tried to remember what to do next.  It was twelve minutes into her first game of hearts and already despaired of understanding it.  Poe, to her right, had put down a Jack of Clubs.  She gave up and showed Finn her hand.  Poe and Hux each took offense at her choice of teacher.

"Hey," said Poe.  "We're better than him.  That's favoritism.  At least ask your boyfriend first."

Rey stifled a cringe at the word.  " _Finn_ won't use my cards to cheat," said Rey.

"I would never," protested Hux.

"But that's _why_ Finn loses.  Hearts requires a killer instinct!" said Poe. Hux glared at him.

Rey looked straight at Hux while showing Finn her hand.  He pointed to the Queen of Clubs.

"You get why?" Finn asked.

" _Nope_!" she said and smacked it down triumphantly.  She won that hand and Hux and Poe brooded in their own particular ways.

 

* * *

 

It was far too late when they decided to get going, and when they stepped outside Rey exclaimed in shock at how very cold it was.  They hurried quickly to the car to get out of it, but the inside of the car was barely any warmer.  They drove around a gravel path toward the back of the lodge.  The car's headlights only showed a little ways ahead.

"You're not gonna murder us, right?" asked Rey.

"Yep," said Poe as he looked from the road to the cabin map.  The map showed a big wooded loop, with little cabins here and there.

"You guys are in sixteen.  We're in twenty-one.  Cool?" Poe asked.

"Sure," said Rey.

"When is breakfast?" asked Hux.  Finn handed him back the brochure.  Hux pulled out his phone to set an alarm.

"Serious about meals?" Rey joked.  

He shot her a glance.  " _Punctual_ ," he said.

"Eats like a horse," Poe said cheerfully.  Hux glowered.

They ground to a halt outside of sixteen.

Rey swallowed.  It was small.  It was very small, and the light from the lodge glowed up over the tree line but didn't make it through the woods. She didn't see any wires or anything going to the little log cabin.

"Need help carrying anything in?" asked Finn.

"I've got it," said Hux.

"You sure?" asked Finn.

"Yes," said Hux.

"Good night, guys," said Finn.  They all said their goodnights as Rey and Hux stepped out of the car.  Poe popped the trunk for them.  Rey jogged around to get there first and reached for her bag.

"I'll get it," Hux said, hurriedly.

"That's, uh—"

"Tell me which," he said.  "You can get the door."

Reluctantly, she pointed out her bag.  He took them and Rey closed the trunk.  As they walked up toward the cabin, Rey heard the car start to crunch away.  Her heart sped up.  She rubbed her hands together to get some feeling back in them.  She watched the headlights go and realized once they did, there'd be no light.  She fumbled for her phone and turned on the flashlight.

"Good thinking," he said.

"Where's the key?"

"I have it."

Rey looked, horrified, from his eye down to his pants pocket and back.

He leaned down and whispered, "Would you get it for me?"

"Uh."

He breathed, "It's in my hand."

Rey's eyes darted until she spotted it looped under the straps of her suitcase.  Her fingers ran across his as she took it from him.  She turned away, red-faced, jabbing the key in the lock and swearing at the cold.  Their teeth chattered.

"Sleeping in the car would not have worked," Hux said.

"Yeah," she said.  " _Fuck_."

She got it open and the door creaked open.  Rey grabbed for a light switch by the door.  She ran her flashlight up and down the wall.  Nothing.  Hux put their suitcases down and retrieved his own phone.

"Oh," he said.  Rey turned.  The beam of his light rested on a lantern, and then on a little wooden stove in the corner.  There was little else except a chest of drawers, a mirror, and large bed with a huge plush comforter and extra blankets tucked underneath.

Rey said, "I think I'm gonna kill him."

" _Absolutely_ ," said Hux with feeling.


	3. Chapter 3

Rey looked around with her flashlight in a panic.  She spotted was a door across the way.  She threw it open.

"Found the toilet," she said.

"Good job," he replied.  Rey could not tell if it was sarcasm.  "Light, please."

"Hm?"  Rey turned.  He'd put his cell phone down, beam pointed at the ceiling.  There was frost on the ceiling and the mirror and on the ground and creeping in the corners of the room.  There was no frost on the walls.  Just hanging snowshoes and wood for the fireplace.  The lantern in Hux's gloved hands squeaked as he pulled the glass globe off.  There was frost on it, too.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Sailing the Nile.  Always wanted to." 

He adjusted the wick on the lamp, squinting, then placed it back on the shelf.   He placed the very tip of his right-hand glove between his front teeth and pulled it off, shaking the cold off his now naked hand as he reached for the matchbook.  The match took on his third try, hissing.  He touched tip to torch, and when he was satisfied with it, replaced the protective globe.  The cabin was illuminated with an uneven paraffin glow.  He made his way over to the stove, inspecting it.

"Need anything?" she asked.

"Do you have anything to drink?"

"No."

"Then I'm afraid not."

"Cool. I'm just gonna...." she shoved her thumb in a bathroom-ways direction.

"Make yourself at home."

The toilet was an adventure.  Boxy, green, and with no apparent plumbing.  Toilet paper not far enough removed from its close tree ancestor.   It did not smell like much in the cold.  Rey bet it was amazing in the summer.  There was a bottle of hand sanitizer and a passive-aggressive note: "baths and showers available at the lodge!  Open 8 to 8!" 

"Great," said Rey.

Rey did her business quickly, minimizing her exposed skin and shivering by the time she was finished.  Her teeth still chattered as she stepped out.  Hux was crouched in front of the open stove, shoving kindling in to stoke the fire.

"Oh, that was quick," she said.

"Mm."

"Have you done this before?"

He held up a booklet.  "There were instructions.  I can read."

Rey took a deep breath, annoyed.  "Would never have guessed."

He didn't say anything.  He shoved another log from the pile by the stove in and closed the front grate.  Rey stuck her hands under her armpits.  It was already a little warmer but close to unbearable.  Her eyes flitted to the bed with its giant fluffy down comforters.

One bed.  Just the one.  She felt her cheeks hot in the bitter cold and looked back at him.  He was looking at her.

"It's not warm yet," he said.

"O-oh?"

"If you get in it won't be warm for a little while.  It's warmer over here."

Rey hesitated.  It was warm right next to him.

"I can step away if you're uncomfortable," he said.

"Nope," she said quickly, hurriedly marching over. 

They stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the tiny stove.  He was very tall, she thought.  He pulled his gloves out from under his arm and put them back on, flexing and unflexing his fingers to work them into the leather.

"So, uh, sleeping," she said.

"Yes," he said.

"There's no way either of us is going on the ground."

"No," he said.  "But thank you for pretending you might."

Rey shrugged, one-shouldered.  

"I might."

"All right."

"No, really.  I'm tough," she said.

"I'm sure you are," he said, unable to sound even a little sincere.

A terrible thought hit her.  She had worn her jeans too long, and would have to wear them longer.  Chafing.

He might feel the same about his own trousers.

"So I'm gonna sleep in this," she said to broach the subject.

He huffed.  "Didn't bring anything?"

"I... thought I had my own room."

"I have an extra set.  If you like."

"You own pajamas?"

He did.  He unzipped his satchel and pulled out a set.  "You may want to wear your snow pants as well," he said.

"T-thanks."

Rey changed in the restroom, cursing under her breath as her clothes took a few degrees with them as they came off.  The collar smelled very faintly of strange detergent. When she finished pulling her snow pants on over the long pajama bottoms.  She considered her crumpled clothing on the bathroom floor and how his eyes would move if she emerged with a wad of cloth balled up in her fist.  She took a moment to fold them before composing herself.

He did look at her clothes first, seeking and not finding anything to judge.  They were just a foot or so away.  He had his second pair and his own snow pants under his arm.  Rey fiddled with the cuff of his pajamas.  They came over the tops of her knuckles.

"Uh, how do I look?" she said.

"I need to use the restroom," he said.

"... OH."

Rey hurried out of the way.  When he closed the door behind him, she closed her eyes, swearing at herself.  

Rey wondered what the hell she was doing for a solid minute until some terrible, awful part of her brain reminded her of something: he was probably naked in there.  He was a man with green eyes, and he was naked.

Rey flitted across the room to the bed and decided the best place to hide her entire body was under the covers.  She climbed in, bunching the huge down comforter up and around her neck.

He took a while.  The room slowly crept back up to just above freezing.  Beads of moisture gathered on the mirror.  He emerged, frowning at the arrangments in the bathroom.  He was built narrow and without his coat or his uniform, in just a cotton button-up set of pajamas and half-frozen, he looked very boyish.

The same part of her brain that drew attention to his nudity volunteered the word _cute._   Rey squirmed.

He took a moment to notice she was not by the stove, and another to spot her in the bed.  His torso jerked before he could compose himself.

"Warm enough?" he said.

"Mm," she replied.  It was the wrong answer, he tensed.  Rey tried a vowel.  "Aa?"

Also not good.  Whole words only.  She tried, "Yeah it's — yes.  Yes."

Silence.  Silence was best.  Hux's breath flowed out of him in long steamy tendrils.

"I suppose we have a big morning," he said.  "We'll — I'll go to bed."

Rey turned away from him, hoping that by looking away it would end the nightmare.  She heard him walk to the lantern and suddenly it was pitch black.  There was no difference between having her eyes opened or closed.  Hux felt for the edge of the bed and found Rey's leg through the comforter.

"Uh," she said.

"Sorry," he said hurriedly.  He found the other side and there was a gust of frigid air as the bed dipped and he moved the comforter aside.  The other side of the bed dipped.  The bed shook as he shivered.

"Warm enough?" she said.

"Yes," he lied.

"There's another blanket," she said.

"This will be fine."

Every little breath or movement shuddered through the bed. Rey turned on her stomach and the bedsprings creaked.  Rey held her body rigid, minimizing the jostling.  His heat mixed with hers under the covers.  The cold had sapped all the energy from her and sleep beckoned her.

 

* * *

 

A horrible repetitive beeping noise rang out.  Rey groaned and pressed her head harder into her pillow to block out the light and noise.

Her very firm pillow.

She jerked away.  Her head and arms had been pressed into his back.  He reached over to the shelf and shut off the alarm.

"I — I am so sorr —"

"It's fine," he said.

"Did I wake you —"

"I've been awake.  It's fine.  It was just cold."

Rey was wide awake and mortified.  Hux didn't look at her as he threw the blankets off and went into the bathroom, dragging his satchel after him.

It was morning and warmer.  The sun streamed in through the frosty windows.  He said nothing and barely looked at her as they went about the business of getting dressed for breakfast.  Since the outside stood between them and breakfast, that meant full snow pants, boots, and coat and hats and gloves besides.

They stepped outside and looked around.  Still no snow and bitter cold, but in the morning light much prettier.  The sun peaked through a low blanket of clouds above.  The woods all around them was thick where the road was not and the tips of the conifers lush even at the tail end of fall.  They waited, taking in the placid silence of nature.

And waited.

Until the same thought dawned on each of them.

"We didn't give Finn and Poe a time to pick us up, did we?" said Rey.

"No," he said.

She sighed.  Hux squinted in either direction down the gravel path.

"Right.  Well, it's less than a mile," he said.

Rey's stomach protested, growling.  "Oh," she said.

"Can't fix that here," he replied to her stomach.  The frost nipping at Rey's face hid it flushing.

There wasn't a noise, not a hint of anyone else alive as they passed a few other cabins on the gravel loop.  By the time they made it to the lodge each had unzipped their jacked to let the heat out from their walk.  Hux checked the time on his phone and seemed pleased.

"Still breakfast?" she said.

"Still breakfast," he confirmed.

 

* * *

 

 

Breakfast, at least, was impressive.  The dining room had lovely high windows and hung over an icy river.  The room was mostly deserted.  An older couple, bored, watched the room along with a few middle-aged people in dark turtlenecks.  One couple played chess by the fireplace, and Rey judged them because it was too picturesque to be a real thing people did.

An overtired man brought out their plates for them, both the same.  There were berries and eggs and toast.  Hux, in particular, seemed pleased with the eggs.  He put his fork down between bites as if fighting with a second unknown force which wanted him to shovel more in.

Finn and Poe were nowhere to be seen.  They had the table to themselves.  Hux had removed his hat, and his bangs lay swept across his brow.  She wished he would fix them, or had at least put that grease in them.  The look was too dear for such a stuffy man.

"Like you an egg, huh?" asked Rey.

He squinted at her, mouth full.  He took his napkin out of his lap to wipe his mouth.  "Beg pardon?"

"Uh, eggs."

"Oh.  I'm used to powdered."

"I think this is real."

He nodded emphatically and took another bite.  They were awfully good eggs, but it felt strangely personal to watch him, interpersonally a bit cold, take pleasure in eating.

Poe spotted them across the room and gave a little whoop.  He strode across the room, commanding its attention the entire way.  Whoever didn't heed took notice when he noisily dragged a chair to Rey and Hux's table.

"You guys didn't wait up!" Poe said cheerfully.

"You didn't pick us up," said Hux.

"You didn't ask."  Poe noticed Finn didn't have a chair and dragged a second over.  Finn smiled sheepishly at the waiter, who hated Poe.  Poe didn't notice.

Finn asked, "Are we on time?"

"I will get you each a plate," said the waiter.

"So!" said Poe.  "What's on the agenda today?"

"I thought you might tell us," replied Hux.  " ** _I_** had planned to ski."

Finn pulled a neatly folded brochure out of his pocket.  "They have a few things.  There's a couples massage."

"What else?" said Hux too quickly.

"Hm, just general bath stuff.  They have a hot spring and some baths on the lower level.  They have a sauna.  That sounds nice."

"Huh," said Rey.

"I know, right?  Oh, and a little after breakfast they have this polar bear thing."

Rey said, "A what?"

Hux said, "They break the ice on the river and have a swim race."

"How do you know?" she said.

"Why don't you?"

"I've never done anything like that.  Have you?"

"Are you asking if I've been in cold water?  Of course."

"Is it hard or anything?" she asked, nonchalant.

"I've got a little practice.  You might find it... difficult," he said.

"But not hard?" He frowned at her.  She clarified. "To you, I mean."

"'Fraid not."

"Then I guess I'll be doing it alone. If it's not hard."

"What?" he said, incredulous.

Rey smiled slowly, needling him, "I mean, if you're not tough enough, that's fine.  You're tired after that drive."

"Fine," he said.  "We'll do it together.  As a couple."

Rey balked, cheeks red.  She looked at Finn who stared, mouth open.

"Don't let me stop you guys," he said.

Hux stood.  He held out his hand to Poe.  "Keys," he said.

"Huh?" said Poe.

"I'm getting our swimsuits from our cabin.  Do you want to come and get yours?"

Poe looked at Hux as if he'd grown a second head.  "Uh, _we're_ doin' the couples massage, man."

Finn nodded and said earnestly, "It sounds amazing.  But the polar bear thing seems really you.  You guys should go for it."

"Yeah," confirmed Poe.  He handed Hux the keys.  "Go for it."

Hux said, "I'll be back with our, swimsuits, honey.  Where did you pack yours?"

"Mixed in with my panties I expect, _pumpkin_."

"Feel free to change your mind while I'm gone.  Maybe you could use a bath," he said and stalked off before Rey could get in another word. 

She stared daggers at him out the door and out to where she thought the car might be.  The waiter brought Finn and Poe their plates.

"You guys are a hoot," said Poe.

Rey's head snapped around.  She wanted to bitch him out for the night she'd been through, but there was Finn, right there.  So she chose another topic.

"Why didn't you tell me you were in the Airforce?"

"Huh?"

"I've known you almost five years.  You never told me."

"I wear that shirt all the time," he protested.

"You used to wear a unicorn shirt all the time.  I don't think you're a unicorn."

Finn pat Poe on the back of his hand.  "Don't listen to her."  Poe grinned at him.

"But seriously," said Rey.

Poe shifted uncomfortably in his chair.  "I mean, to be honest, I didn't think you'd find it interesting," he said.

"Huh?"

"You know I love you.  But you get these ideas about what's interesting or cool, and you're just not interested in anyone else's version."

"I am."

Poe pointed his fork at her, accusing.  "No."  He pointed harder when she was already balking.  "No, listen.  See, I would have listened to Hux talk about his radio towers thing.  Because he's a guy who's seen some stuff I haven't.  Good guy.  Smart guy.  If he sees something in something, I pay attention.  I don't love everything he loves, but I see why he loves it."

"You're his best friend, though."

"Yeah.  That's why.  He didn't become my best friend and then I pretended to be fascinated.  I was interested.  And if you're interested...." said Poe.  He flicked his eyes up and down meaningfully.

"Oh stop," said Rey.  She remembered Finn.  "Of course I am."

Poe said, gently, "Give the guy a break?"

Rey thought about it while the boys shoveled down their eggs and toast.  It was ridiculous as her heart beat fast, but seemed to make a little more sense as she started calming down.  Rey almost entertained a charitable thought.

In barged Hux to ruin it:  bright red from the cold, clutching their swimsuits in his fist and holding them out in front of them for everyone to see.

"We have fifteen minutes to change and be at the front desk," he said to her.

Rey's cheeks flushed red.  She marched up to him snatched her swimsuit from him.

"I'll be ready in ten," she replied.

"So you'll be on time?  Perfect."

Rey turned away from him, unsure where the changing rooms were, and marched in a direction and another until she got one of them right.

She would _crush_ him.


	4. Chapter 4

Rey pulled her swimsuit on and her coat and snow pants over it.  She shoved her clothes in one of the available lockers and marched back out as fast as she could hoping to beat Hux to the front desk.

Exercise was not her favorite, but she'd done track in high school and took classes at the gym so she wouldn't get bored.  Rey could take all but one of the dudes in her CrossFit class on in a race easy, and beat him about half the time.

Rey was quick.  She was not going to let Hux win.  Absolutely not.

She beat him to the front desk by thirty seconds and then cursed when she saw he'd thought to bring towels and had somehow commandeered a blanket from housekeeping in barely more time it had taken her to get dressed.  He crossed his free arm across his chest and wouldn't look at her.  Rey spotted Finn and Poe, still at their table, laughing.  They stood and ambled over.

"How long's this gonna take?" Poe asked the employee.

"Uh, just a few minutes."

"Can you see the polar bear run from the dining room terrace?"

"Yeah," the employee replied.

"Cool,"  he said.  "I'll be rooting for you."

"Which one?" asked Hux.

Finn said, "No favorites."

Poe said, "Oh, I'm rooting for Rey."

Rey beamed at Hux, who looked at both of them with hooded eyes.

"But who are you betting on?"

Poe clapped Rey on the shoulder.  "Good luck, Rey."

Rey glanced over at Hux who did not look devastated.  Not even remotely.  As Poe and Finn made their way back to the balcony to watch, she played Poe's words back over and over.

Doubt crept in.

A very tired hotel worker in full snow gear holding a ski pole slumped as he realized people were actually interested. 

The worker tried, "I'm not sure we have enough peop—"

"You do," Hux barked. Rey and the employee each stood a little straighter.  He looked at Rey for backup, but Rey was no port in that storm.  No race, no whipping Hux's smug ass.  Unacceptable.  She let her resting bitch face do the work and the employee withered under the couple's cooperative death-glare.

The clock at the reception desk beeped as the top of the hour came.  Nine in the morning.  They headed out.  They stepped outside and as the wind bit the exposed skin on Rey's face and neck, she began to wonder if she might have made a mistake.  She tried to distract herself from Hux, who was completely unbothered, by talking to the employee.

"What's that for?" asked Rey, referring to the pole in his hand.

Hux said, "To break the ice."

Rey felt a little stab in her gut and looked for a sign that might be a lie.  The employee looked relieved not to have to talk to her.

Rey lagged a little further behind them as they reached the river out back.  There was a crook in the creek near the dock where the water flowed a little faster, and in the middle of that heavy flow there was no ice.  The employee climbed up on the dock and whacked a few times at the membrane of ice, and it shattered.  He walked to the edge of the dock and whacked at the ice on the other side as well.  The water looked thicker, shinier somehow than flowing warm water.

Rey asked, "What do we do?"

"Just there and back," said the employee.

Hux unzipped his jacket and shrugged it off, wincing at the cold and rolling his shoulders this way and that.  Rey slumped further as he pulled down his snow pants.  He had taken a narrow frame and laid on top of it wiry muscle. The backs of his legs were an anatomy class.  Hux handed his clothes to the instructor.  She could see the muscles move in his back, over his ribs.

This had been a mistake.

He turned.  His nipples were bubblegum pink, blue-undertoned like his lips.  She balked at them.  He frowned at her, rubbing his nose with the back of his arm before bending to take his boots off.

"Don't make me wait," he said.

Rey swallowed. She turned and unzipped her jacket and swore under her breath, and did not turn around again until her boots were off.  She turned.  Hux's eyes flicked up and down quickly.  Legs, breasts, collarbone, and away, face still as anything.  No reaction.  None.

She would crush him.

Rey's fight returned, redoubled.  She dropped her clothes right there, on the dirt.  

She swung her arms, scowling and cracking her back.

She heard a whoop from up on the terrace.  Finn and Poe had stepped out, jacketless, arms tucked under their armpits.

"You get 'em," hollered Poe.

"Give us a count down," said Rey to the employee.

"It's— it's not actually a race?" the employee said.  Rey and Hux each pretended not to hear.

"Count of three," said Hux.

"Right."

"One.  Two.  —"

They were both off before "Three" escaped his lips, both kicking off into a mad sprint.  Rey hit the water first and it smacked her shins like a brick wall, and she was waist deep and screaming as she ran.  It was like being stabbed with a needle that somehow covered her entire lower half.

"Oh my— fuck!" she screamed.  It was as if in a nightmare, running in waist-deep water made of knives.

Hux, having not spent any of his effort screaming, ran up onto the other shore and turned before Rey touched it.  The little bare patch of skin above his shorts was an angry burn-like red. His eyes slid past her as he turned and ran past her and back into the water, unphased.

"Fuck," she cried as she tagged the shore and tore in after him, bellowing displeasure and pushing as hard as she could through the pain of it.  At the half-way mark she made it past his shoulder, but just as Poe whooped again in delight she could push no harder.  He was two strides ahead when he touched the shore, sliding in the mulch as he threw his legs in front of him to slow his gait.

Rey stepped out of the water and bent to grab her legs, screaming in frustration.

Poe called down "That was pretty fucking good.  She coulda had you!"

"Hardly," Hux bit back.  He ran his forearm over his now-running nose, chest working as he caught his breath.

"You're out of shape, partner."

Finn called down, "You OK?"

Hux replied before Rey could, "I'm fine."  She glared at him.  Of course, he assumed Finn meant him.  She looked up at Finn to catch his eye and see if he got how arrogant that was.  However, Finn did not meet her eye.  Finn was looking at Hux.  He'd meant Hux.

Poe shivered.  "All right, I'm dying a little.  Back into the warm!" said Poe.  He called back after him,  "Good job guys!"

As Hux took the towel back from the hotel worker, she saw his shorts slip down a little.  There was a little red seam standing up on his lower abdomen.  It was not yet a scar.  He squinted over at her as he dried himself off and she looked away.  She toddled, stiff-limbed, over to her clothes.

"Do you need a towel?" Hux asked.

"I'm fine," she said.  She started shoving her still wet legs into her snow pants.  She felt a light weight and rough texture on her back, unrecognizable against her numb skin, and jumped.  He'd tossed one of the towels be brought over her back.

"Don't be prideful," he said.

  Rey sniffed and, having the towel already, quickly dried and pulled the snow pants and jacket on over her wet swimsuit.  Dirt stuck to her clothes, and her clothes stuck to her, and her skin still felt numb and painful, like it'd be pulled so tight it might tear over her feet on up.  She shoved her miserable toes in her boots and nearly cried.  She looked up, half expecting Hux to be striding off, cocksure in his victory.  The employee was wandering back up the incline.

Hux was standing next to her, the blanket around his shoulders, edges of it in his fist.  He held one end across his chest and had the other out, like a bird's wing unfurled.  She stared.

"Are you coming?" he asked.  Her eyes darted from the space by his side to his face.

Her skin hurt.  She didn't have it in her to turn down a chance at it just stopping.

"Fuck," she said.  She shuffled up to him and closed her eyes, waiting for him to get it over with.  His arm wrapped around her.  She tried taking a step, but he wouldn't.

"Your elbow," he said.

She pressed her lips together and put her arm around his waist.  The blanket wrapped around her shoulder.  It was marginally warmer.  They started walking.  As stiff as the cold made her, she made herself stiffer under his arm.

"Don't seem so pleased," he said.

"I lost."

"It's a little insulting to see you sulk.  If you'd had any training you might have won."

"I run."

"I mean in the cold," he said.  "You weren't prepared.  I worked for years, and this is all I have to show for it.  Barely beat a female civilian."

She bristled.  "You could try to be nicer."

His face contorted into a not-smile, cheeks bunched up in complete disbelief at her.  He shrugged the blanket off and put it around her shoulders.

"Hey," she said.  He strode on ahead.  Rey watched him walk off without a word.

Her walk slowed as she thought.  She watched him push through the double doors of the lodge.

"Oh," she said.  And then, a minute later, as her brain fully caught up to her mouth, she said, "... Oh, fuck."

 

* * *

 

 

Rey couldn't find him.  Someone pointed her toward the baths, but by the time she got there he'd already gone in.  They weren't co-ed.  Rey debated getting a bath or waiting for him, but the sting on her skin dictated the course of action.  Warm bath it was.

The locker room was empty.  There were signs up directing her to shower first.  Rey didn't much get the point, but she stripped and quickly scrubbed off before stepping into an area labeled "women's bathing room."  There was a large blue-tiled tub, and in the busy season, it perhaps could have held two dozen women.

But it was just Rey, alone, in the little bathing room.  With only herself and what she'd done to think about.

She sunk down to her nose in the water and felt sorry for herself.

Somehow she'd managed to find a jerk and be the queen jerk to him.  She played that image of the red dip in his skin.  And the muscles there, on his abdomen.  He'd had recent surgery.  She'd barely lost an in-water race to a Navy war veteran who'd had recent surgery.  A war veteran with stupid, amazing abs.  Also, possibly an OK guy.

A possibly OK guy who, in retrospect, had been interested in her.  And now, certainly, really really wasn't.  And she knew in her heart of hearts she wouldn't have noticed if not for those legs and abs.  She'd have just drifted through life drop-kicking orphans and eating the hearts out of slightly-less-hot injured war vets.  Oblivious.

Rey winced at her thought process and sank further down in the water to scream a little.

 

* * *

 

She stepped out of the bath more exhausted than she thought possible and weirdly, craving something salty.  She spotted Hux's heel clicking down the hall and she jogged after, wincing at her aching muscles.

"Hey," she said.

He didn't say anything.  It was like she wasn't there.

"Uh," she said.  He stopped.  He turned.  His hair was wet and slicked back, and he looked as tired as she felt.

"Look—" he said.

"I fucked up," she interrupted.

"We'll get along for the rest of the weekend, and then you don't have to see me again."

Rey looked at the ground.  She played with her fingers.  "I fucked up really bad."

He shook his head, lips pressed together.  Rey winced.

"I'll see you at lunch," he said.  He walked off.

Rey wandered around the lodge until she found a small library.  She sulked in there, pretending to read until lunch.

 

* * *

 

The boys were already all seated at a table tearing off little bits of bread from the center bread basket and leaning forward toward one another.  Hux looked a little better.  His hair had dried and was flopping forward.  Poe said something and he nearly laughed.  Hux pushed the hair out of his face, smiling. He spotted her and it dropped back over his forehead, suddenly and annoyingly, unobtainable adorable.  Rey stopped walking to hate herself a moment.

"Heeey!" said Poe, waving her over.  She approached the table like a stranger, pulling out the chair. 

"How was your massage?"

"Amazing," said Finn.

Poe nodded confirmation.  "Seriously great.  You should try it.  Real bonding thing.  Maybe after lunch for you guys?"

"I think I need a nap," said Rey.

Hux cleared his throat, gray-faced.  It dawned on Rey that was his plan as well.  She watched his face move with the calculus of not getting the nap he wanted.  She felt like the biggest jerk in the world.

Finn, a child of divorce, looked from Hux to Rey.

"Race took a lot out of you?" he ventured.

"Yes," said Rey hurriedly.

"Aw.  Well, you're both really competitive.  I guess not the best thing to have in common."

"Indeed," said Hux with an implied finality which was lost on Finn.  He gave them a knowing smile.

"It might not be all bad.  Next time Rey can come first."

Hux's eyebrows rose and Poe leaned forward to spit his water back into his glass.

"Oh, Jesus," Poe said.  "Sweetheart!"

"What?" said Finn with mock innocence.

"That probably won't happen," said Rey, attempting a joke.

It failed spectacularly.  All three men froze, glancing at one another.  Overcome with curiosity, Poe ventured the question.  "Oh?  Uh... why?"

Rey turned red.  She opened her mouth and words came out.  "I don't— I mean with sex I— you know, this is not— OK.  I'm— OK.  All right," she said.  She reached for the bread basket, tore herself off a gag, and popped it into her mouth.

"... Couples massage was so good you guys," said Finn.

"How did you meet?" asked Hux, finding an actual change of topic.  Rey glanced over at him.  The bridge of his nose and tops of his cheeks glowed.

"Work!" said Finn.  "I picked up temp work doing waiter stuff at a wedding."

"And I was at my cousin's wedding, and I saw this guy.  And he had these eyes.  And that mouth," he said.  He contemplated Finn for a moment and scooted forward, driven by impulse.  He pecked Finn on the mouth, pausing a few inches away from Finn's face.  Finn closed his eyes and right as Poe exhaled, Finn smiled, tickled by Poe's breath on his cheeks.  Poe continued.  "And I went, 'man.  It'd be just my luck if he's straight.'"

Finn opened his eyes and whispered, as if to spoil the end, "I wasn't."

"How do you know if it's love?" asked Rey.  "Like... how fast?"

Hux cleared his throat.  Poe said, "Aaah, you don't."

"I did," said Finn.

"Aww, gross," said Poe, pecking Finn on the mouth again.  He grinned, grabbing Finn's hand and rubbing it.  "Sorry, we're so gross."

"It's nice to see you happy," said Hux.  Between the attention from Poe and Hux and Rey, Finn came over bashful suddenly.

"What about you guys?" he asked.

"Us?" said Rey.

"Yeah."

"Oh, you know.  You were there."

"No," said Hux.

Rey said, "Huh?"

"He was not."

Poe gave him a tight smile.  "Uh, you don't have to—"

"It's fine," said Hux.  He ran his hand over his face.  "We, uh, we met a few years ago."

"Wait, really?"

Hux nodded.  "I think three.  I was just back from Qatar.  Just a visit.  Thanksgiving at mom's, and Poe asked me to board game night.  It was the Friday after and I wouldn't see him otherwise."

Finn said, "Oh yeah.  I'm usually at my parents' place at Thanksgiving."

Rey's eyebrows rose.  She remembered the party.  She did not remember Hux.  "You were there?"

Hux cleared his throat.  "We played Balderdash.  I was winning.  I'm good at guessing the meanings of words."

"I won, though," said Rey.  She remembered that.

"Yes.  You were... funny."  Hux explained, as an aside to Finn, "You get points for people guessing your definition.  And you kept coming up with...these definitions people knew were wrong, and people voted for them anyway.  There was a word, 'runch.'  It's a grain.  Your definition was, 'A meal eetween reakfast and lunch where you can't be.'  Memorable.  I knew the right definition.  I knew you were a point away and that definition had to be yours.  You'd been writing things like that all night.  I knew you'd win if I voted for yours instead of the right one."

"You're saying you let me win," said Rey flatly.

"No," he said, irritated.  "That's the point of the game.  It was the best answer, of course I voted for it.  You were so pleased with yourself.  You laughed and—"  Hux's eyelashes fluttered.  He stopped himself and started again.  "In any case, I was leaving two days later.  I don't think I said a word beyond 'congratulations' to you.  I'm not charming like that with new people. You have this ease I don't.  I wrote it off as terrible timing.  I don't regret my time in the Navy.  I didn't think of you often or anything.  There are things you wonder if you're missing out on in the service, and certain moments represent that loss to you  I thought if I had a little more time, I—"  He pressed his thumb against his lips to silence himself.  The other hand was balled out in front of him in a fist on the tablecloth.

Rey realized she was holding her breath.  She exhaled.

"Well, it's moot now," Hux said.

"Wow," said Finn.  He'd caught that Hux was moved, but not which spirit moved him.

Rey looked at his hand, and his face, and his hand again.  Impulsively, she put her hand over his fist.  She heard him swallow.

"I'm fine, sweetheart," he muttered. "I'm just tired."

"Yeah," she said.  She didn't move her hand.  She felt his knuckles flex under her hand. "I'm— I'm also pretty tired."

He nodded faintly.  He glanced at her and away, and his face went stonier when he caught her look.

A waitress came by.  Poe shooed her.  Hux closed his eyes.  His hand relaxed and her fingers curled under his palm.  He squeezed.

"W-we should eat," Hux said, finally.

They did.  Poe and Finn valiantly tried to carry a four-person conversation on their shoulders.  Hux and Rey made occasional grunting noises and took turns trying to catch and avoid one another's gaze.  Rey and Hux stared at their empty plates, pink and absent.

"You need my keys?" asked Poe.

"Hm?" said Hux.

"You guys look bushed.  We'll walk to our the cabin tonight.  Take the car."

Finn nodded.  "Yeah, go rest."

Hux's near-green eyes met Rey's.  Rey contemplated the quality of rest they might get, and from his subtle change in breathing he did as well.

"Okay," said Rey.

Hux swallowed hard.


	5. Chapter 5

Rey waited in the car, sweating in her snowsuit.  Hux stopped by the gift shop first, so Rey was left to stew.

They would head back to nap.  Same bed again.  Rey couldn't think of anything else to distract herself.  She tried not to think at all.  She pressed her gloved palms together so her hands wouldn't shake.

He came out the lodge's front doors, bounding down the steps, all long legged.  Rey looked away, forward at the frost on the windshield.

Hux tossed a plastic sack in the footwell and handed over a gallon of water.

"They make you buy it?" she said to say something.

He grunted.  "Nine dollars.  Highway robbery."

Rey spotted a pair of prepackaged sandwiches in a plastic sack.  A smaller paper sack rested inside.  Rey was reminded of the sacks they'd break out for tampons and other intimate supplies at drug stores.  She found herself holding her breath so it wouldn't be so obvious she was out of breath.

Hux turned the ignition and exhaled, his breath steaming up the window.  He hadn't been breathing either.

It took a minute for the car to heat up and the frost to start dripping down off the windshield.

"T-that race really took it out of me," she said.

"Yes," he said.

"You too?"

"Yes. I'm tired."

"Right.  Even with your training?"

He stiffened.  Discussion of his Navy life hadn't gone well with them.  "Yes."

"Guess that's why you won.  You've worked really hard."

The engine hummed.  They both sat there, eyes forward.  A little chunk of clear ice broke off the edge and left a thick smear behind it as it slid down the middle of the windshield.

She said,  "Uh, congratulations on winning."

He relaxed a little as he put the car into drive.  "Thank you." 

Gravel crunched under the car.

Rey asked, "After you uh, the party where we met.  You went back to Qatar?"

"No.  That's when I went to Germany."

"What did you do there?"

"I oversaw the maintenance of several communications systems we used jointly with other branches. Mostly the infrastructure, although it sometimes overlapped with other information technology work.  I oversaw a department with about two hundred people."

That seemed like a lot of responsibility for anyone close to her age.

"How long were you in?" she asked.

"Twelve years."

Rey did the math.  He'd been to college, and then twelve years of service after that  He and Poe roomed together in college.  He was probably Poe's age.  Poe wasn't old, Poe was Poe.  Everyone else Poe's age was old.  At least a decade older.

 _Experienced_ , her brain volunteered.

She swallowed.  "That's, uh.  Wow."

"I know. Thrilling."

"No.  I mean, no.  I — th-that's an accomplishment.  What did you major in?"

"Engineering."

"Wow," said Rey.  Engineering majors had options.  "Uh, why'd you join the Navy?"

They pulled up to the cabin.  He glanced out of the corner of his eye at her.  "Why not?"

"I'm just trying to understand.  You know?"

He pressed his lips together.  He understood maybe too well.  

"I was young.  Engineering school is grueling and I felt like I'd never done anything but study.  I suppose some people that age grab a backpack and go to another continent, but —" he frowned. "That sort of thing makes me suspicious.  I'd go there and do... what?  Dabble at authenticity?  Sloppy.  But the Navy had a process.  There was a structure, values to meet, processes to follow.  It's not just peak experiences to sample.  Effort is connected to experience and to higher values in ways that I found meaningful.  Not like how some people just go backpacking after graduation to say they did it."

Rey felt a little stab of anger, first at him and then at herself.  It was petty.  She was going to let it go.

"Hm?" he said.

"Nothing," she said.  She just needed a second to ride it out, but he kept looking at her.

"Did I offend you?"

"I went backpacking in California after I graduated."

"Ah," he said.  He blew his breath out.  "Did you, uh, like it?"

"It was a nice, fake vacation.  A little sloppy, though.  A lot like this one."  

She closed her eyes. They sat in silence for a minute before he shut the engine off. Rey's temper receded, fading to an aching, awkward embarrassment.  Rey glanced over at Hux.

"Did you have surgery recently?" Rey asked.

He said, quietly, "Let's just go to sleep."

"Okay," said Rey.  He reached down between her shins to grab the plastic sack.

They stepped out below the low blanket of cloud.  He walked ahead to the cabin, keys out.  She watched him from far off, bitter cold and terribly alone. As he opened the door he looked back for her and saw she was still standing by the car.

"Just a minute," she said.

He turned and walked inside, closing the door behind him.  So there she was.  Outdoors, in the bitter cold, wishing to anything she'd just gone indoors.  Stuck standing there until a minute had passed.

"What is wrong with me?" she muttered.

 

* * *

 

 

By the time Rey came inside he'd started the fire and was changing in the bathroom.  Rey spotted the plastic sack with the sandwiches and the paper bag near, but not too near, the stove.  She glanced at the bathroom door and pulled her gloves off quickly so her fingers were free.

Carefully, she bent and parted the bag's handles.  She winced as it crinkled and pulled out the little paper sack.  The contents, a square box, rattled softly.

Her breath caught in the top of her lungs.  She didn't need to look.  She tipped the sack over and let it slide out into her palm anyway.

Condoms.

The bathroom door clicked open and in that instant she knew she was not quick enough, and froze, staring ahead at the wall, still crouching.  She did not see him look at her, but she felt it in her sternum.  There was a moment of sick, terrible silence before she heard his footsteps head behind her, and then him climbing into bed.

She dropped the sack back into the bag and stood, walking to the dresser where she'd set her folded pajamas from the night before.  She glanced up at the mirror at him.  He was under the covers.  He'd  turned toward the window, head propped up on his wrist, looking outside.

Rey got dressed in the bathroom.  Rey came out and he had closed his eyes.  She climbed into bed next to him, a million miles apart.

 

* * *

 

Rey's eyes opened, and there he was, across the bed in the dim evening light.  His bangs were forward across his eyebrows.

Rey wondered why she had to be so fucking clever.  Too fucking cool for one of her best friends in the world to tell her about being a fucking pilot.  These were people who knew her better than she knew herself, and that's what they thought of her.

They thought she'd learn something that personal and central to Poe's life and decided it would be best not to share it with her.  Because Rey would be bored.

People bored one another all the time and it was no big deal. That's not why Poe withheld it from her. 

She replayed conversations, years back.  Many years back.  A handful of moments she'd recalled but did not understand clicked into place.  

People's lives were pearls, and Rey was a swine.

She rubbed a tear out of her eye.

Hux stretched and slowly, opened his eyes.

"Hi," he said.  He blinked slowly.  The white comforter in front of her moved as he ran his hand over the bedspread, into the space between them, and stopped.   All she had to do to bridge the gap was reach for him.

Her eyes watered and she felt embarrassed at how red they must have been.  She looked past him, above him, out the window.

There was a little movement there.  Rey's lips parted.

"Hm?"  he said.

"Is that snow?" she breathed.

Hux turned over to look out the window, but Rey had already thrown the covers off, stumbling like a newborn fawn, hissing as her bare feet touched the cold cabin floor.  She threw the door open.

It can't have been much past six; close to sunset at that time of the year.  Fat, wide clumps fell from the sky and onto the building layer of accumulating snow on the ground.  It laid in a fine blanket across the boughs of the evergreens across the gravel way.  She could still see the indent where the mulch met the road.   It was hard to tell where the light came from.  It reflected off the ground and gave everything an even, numinous glow.

The air was so still and so very quiet.  She couldn't hear herself breathe.  Nothing was happening and in that negative space between moments, it felt like anything might.  She looked up at the sky. Even the clouds glowed faintly.  Rey covered her open mouth with her palm.

"What is it?" Hux said.

Rey could not say anything.  Rey heard him, quietly, step up behind her.  He looked, and they looked out.  Rey bent and, tentative, reached out to run her fingertips through the accumulated blanket of snow at the doorstep.  It gave unevenly, wetting her fingers.  She turned her hand over to watch the little crystals turn to droplets and run down off her hand.  Rey looked up at him.  He was watching her, lips parted, eyebrows pulled together.

He was, she realized, moved.  He'd watched her and gathered exactly what was going on.  Rey looked back out over the snow, embarrassed she was so transparent.  She stood, leaning against the doorframe, back to him.

"Do you want to go outside?" he asked.

She shook her head faintly.  "I'll just look."

Rey watched it snow, desperate to cross the threshold but unable to bring herself to do it.  Hux stepped away for a moment.  Rey felt a weight on her shoulders.  He'd draped her coat over them.  She turned to see him pulling his own on.

"Step outside," he said.

"W-why?"

"Trust me," he said.  "If you don't you'll wish you had"  He stepped into his boots.

Rey took a very deep breath.

If she took a step, her whole life might be different.

She stepped through.

The snow was cold under and between her toes.  She wanted to feel it.  She took a few steps, feeling the snow crunch under her, and looked up.  Massive snowflakes gathered in her lashes.  She held her hands out to catch what she could.  One clump of them stayed a while in her palm, melting slowly into a fat bead of water.  She had thought the flakes themselves would be smaller, like grains of sand.  Instead, the largest were geometric lacework masterpieces, wide across as uncooked lentils.

She didn't know how long she stood there, but Rey's feet touched the dirt under the snow.  Her feet had gone from painful to numb to painful again.  She turned.  Hux was just outside the doorway, leaning there, watching her.  He'd pulled the door shut to keep in the warm.

"Hi," she said.  He gave her a tight smile.

Snow had started to fill in the footsteps she'd left.  He turned to open the door for her.

"Wait," she said.

Rey's feet hurt.  The snow crunched lightly as she closed the gap between them until there was only a little gap of air between her and him for snowflakes to fall through.  Rey rubbed her hands together, holding them against her chest to warm them.  The button that fell between her breasts pushed into her skin.

"I'm so glad I came," she said.

His breathing was shallow.  He looked down at her, through his lashes, not saying anything and not moving.  The corners of his eyebrows moved up and in like it might hurt to look at her.

She said, "I'm glad you came."

Hux bent and hesitated, his head tilted, and she felt him draw breath between his lips a fraction of a moment before he pressed his mouth over hers.

Rey stood on her tiptoes to press firmer into him. She opened her lips for him and he pulled away, looking into her eyes, breathing heavy. Fearful, perhaps, her reaction was disgust and not an invitation.  He searched her face and when he saw her look he kissed her again, reaching to stroke her face as she threw her arms around his neck to hold herself up to him.

She pulled away to catch her breath and pressed her forehead into his.  She did not open her eyes again.

"M-my feet are really cold," she said.

"Let's go inside," he breathed.

"Okay."

They untangled for the few seconds it took for him to turn and open the door and walk through, and close again, and it was torture being so far away from his mouth and contemplating re-negotiating back to it and onto the bed, and how far the condoms were from either of them.

Rey took a few steps forward, stiff, robotic, until he, wrapped his arms around her, his chest flush against her back. His lips brushed her ear.

"I —" she said.  "I've been tested."

"Shh," he said.

"And I take bir —"

"Shhh."

Rey's breath was heavy and became heavier as felt his, hot against her cheek.  Their coats and snow pants were unwelcome chaperones, hiding the contours of their bodies from one another.  His lips on her ear was all she had of his skin.  She ached for more.

He said, quietly.  "I'd like to make you feel good."

"D-don't worry about it," she said.

"What do you need for that?  What can I do for you?"

Rey winced.  She'd said too much at lunch, and he'd figured it out.  It hadn't been entirely a joke.  "I, uh.  I don't —"  She closed her eyes.  "I haven't f-figured that out.  With sex.  I don't come with sex."

"Oral?"

Rey winced and, deciding on honesty, shook her head tersely.

"By yourself?"

Rey nodded.  

She felt ill.

She'd never admitted that to someone she was sleeping with.  She clenched her eyes shut and blew her breath out of her mouth, wondering if she'd fucked it up.  Sex always felt good, but frustrating.  It was annoying to explain to men.  She still felt this lovely, soft high afterward, and that was enough for Rey. Men, however, were needy babies.  Men needed to see her mouth open and eyes clench or they'd never leave her alone for the night.

"Would you be comfortable showing me?"

Rey took a deep breath.

"It —it feels good anyway.  If it doesn't work, would you still —"

She felt him nod.

"Okay," she said.  

She pulled his arms off of her and walked shakily to the bed.

Rey imagined she was alone.  This had all been a fantasy.  Some handsome, boyish sailor existed only in her head.   The fantasy was that he wanted to watch her.  Rey shrugged her jacket off of her shoulders and heard it drop as she climbed up into bed and pulled the covers over her.  

She lay on her belly, face away from him and toward the window. The light was starting to wane outdoors.  It was still snowing. Behind her, the lantern hood squeaked as Hux pulled the globe off to light it.  Once it was lit, the light reflected against the glass and she could see him silhouetted, facing the bed and watching.  Rey closed her eyes and slipped her hand under her and between her legs.  She used the weight of her hips to press her fingertips against her folds.

She thought of his bangs over his brow, and how his abdomen moved when he tried to catch his breath that morning.  She stroked rhythmically and thought of how firm his lips were against hers.

Rey heard a rustle of fabric.  As he crept up behind her, Rey saw the long shadow he cast on the wall flicker and shrink.  The blanket peeled down past her shoulders, down under her hips.  

She was fully clothed and had never in her life felt more naked.   She ground her hips into her hand beneath her, rocking her hips.

"Oh," he said.  It was like a sigh.  Rey squirmed.  She pressed her knees together to increase the pressure.

The mattress dipped as he climbed up.  He straddled her, his hips aligned with hers.  He bent over her.  She squeezed her eyes closed as she felt his breath against her cheek.  A little squeak escaped her lips.

"Am I distracting you?" he whispered.

"No," she said.

His thumbs hooked under the elastic of her snow pants and the pajamas undernearth.  Rey lifted her hips for a moment and he pulled them down.  Rey tensed in the cold.

"T-that's distracting," she said.

Hux pulled the blanket up over them, and, warm once more, made progress toward her goal.  She felt his hips drop against hers, and then his torso against her back.  Through their clothes she felt his body heat.  He'd taken off his snow pants.  There was a thin layer of cloth between her and his erection, and the ache between her legs started to become unbearable.

Hux pushed his hand between the bed and her body, down her arm.  She pulled her hand away to make room for his.

"No.  Keep going," he whispered.  His fingers stopped at the back of her hand, at the knuckles.  Rey started touching herself again for him.  He felt her rhythm.  Rey gasped as he started moving, grinding his hips, mimicking the pace she was moving at.

"O-Oh my —"

"How close are you?" he whispered.

"Please fuck me," she said.

She heard him swallow.  He pulled away for a moment, one hand still over hers, to pull his pants down one-handed.   When he returned it was his skin on her skin, his erection pressed between her buttocks.

"Oh my God," she said.

"You're on the pill?" he asked desperately.  "You're clean?"

"U-uh-huh," she said, pleasure bleeding through into her voice.

He pulled her hips up and the tip of his cock brushed against her fingers.  Rey pressed him up inside of her and he thrust firm, all the way in all at once.  Rey cried out and his hips bucked against hers.

"D-don't move," he begged.  "Don't move."

"Okay," she breathed.

The blanket had slipped off of them.  Rey's nipples brushed against the inside of his pajama tops, hard and almost painful.

"Can I move my hand please?"

"Yes," he said.

Rey started stroking herself again, but with her hips up and her legs parted to make room for him, the pressure was not there.  She sighed in frustration.

"What do you need?" he asked.

"Push my hand," she said.

He put his hand over hers and pressed, hard.   When she moved her fingers felt that sweet ache build again.

"Like that?" he asked.

"Just like that," she gasped. 

Her hips involuntarily rocked from the pleasure.  He groaned and, unable to resist it any longer, started moving, slow and deep inside of her, as if moving for his own special gratification.  Taking what he needed from her.

That sent Rey over the edge.  Her knees spread, opening wider to him as the orgasm racked her body.  He gripped onto her, limiting her movement, hissing as she tightened around his cock.  She shuddered, feeling the muscles contract around him, redoubling her pleasure through every little aftershock.

"Oh my God," she said.  Just as she thought it was over, her torso jerked again.  Rey breathed through it.  Sweat broke out over her back.

Once she had caught her breath a little, she turned her head. For the first time since they'd gotten indoors, she looked Hux in the face.  He was flushed, eyes hooded.  He leaned forward and kissed her.

"Turn over?" he said.  Rey nodded.  

He pulled out and she turned.  He kicked his half-down snow pants the rest of the way off and pulled his shirt over his head, not bothering with the buttons.

He knelt between her legs.  Rey looked him up and down.  His skin was milk white, the rounded tops of his muscles turned pink by the chill. Her eyes passed over his just-healed incision on his abdomen, at the muscles of thighs, at his cock, still wet from being inside of her. 

He leaned forward to fumble at the buttons on her shirt until she, following his lead, pulled it up over her head and tossed it aside.  He sat on his heels and stared.

They were naked with one another.  The lantern flickered.  They were broken out in goose pimples.  Rey wished she could believe it was just the cold.  She thought of him wanting her for years, thinking about her when he touched himself.

And now there he was and there she was.  He drank in every detail of her body.

Finally, Rey, unable to handle the cold any longer, grasped his forearms to draw him to herself.  He pulled the blankets up over him and descended on her, kissing her as his cock pushed back inside of her.  Her nipples brushed against his chest as he ground her hips into the bed. The springs of the bed pushed her back into him.  He'd catch her at a certain angle, and she gasped.

With every noise she made his control wavered.   He pulled away from the kiss as his breath became labored.  His long, smooth strokes turned shorter, needier, until he drove himself deep inside of her, his hot stomach pressed against hers. He quaked.

Hux sighed into her ear.  Rey's voice, unbidden, echoed.

He pushed up, onto his elbows, grinning in drugged pleasure, eyes closed.  After a moment eyelashes fluttered open and squeezed closed again, like he'd looked directly into the sun.  He sunk down on her and, pushing his arms between her and the mattress, embraced her.  Rey's legs were still wrapped around him.

He was hugging her, she realized.  They'd just fucked — perhaps they were still fucking since he had not pulled out — and they were hugging.

That was new for her.

She, tentatively, put her palms on his back.

"Hey, buddy," she said.  She cringed at herself, but he, high as a kite, took it as affection and laughed.  He squeezed her tighter.

This was not something she had expected.  This was not how men acted with her.

They hadn't fucked, she realized.

That had been love-making.

Rey barely knew the guy, and he'd had the audacity to make love to her like he knew her or something.  He'd debugged her orgasm like he might any other machine.  Then he'd made love to her while she was still hopped up on her own natural goofballs.  The shock of it ran down her spine between her legs, and he groaned as her muscles tensed around him.  He was still somewhat hard.  

It felt incredible. 

He had the _nerve_ to still be hard for her.

If Rey were not shocked she might have been furious.

He lifted his head off of her shoulder and looked at her with those beautiful green eyes he had no fucking right carry in his head while his dick was inside of her.   He kissed her.  She desperately tried to remember her objections.   His mouth on hers tricked her into finding those objections ridiculous.  Her body demanded his and shut her brain right down.

At some point he rolled her over and did something completely unfair with his tongue on her nipples.  She rode all her frustration out and screamed when he made her come again.  He smiled at her and stroked her hair; a real _asshole_.

Rey was not prepared for this.


	6. Chapter 6

Rey woke up disoriented, sore, and with Hux's arm wrapped around her waist.  

Rey was starving.  They hadn't gotten to the sandwiches he'd gotten from the gift shop before they'd gone crisp with frost at the edges, so their late night dinner had been very meager.

Hux's alarm was sounding.

He groaned and stretched, his fingers splaying against her stomach as he pulled her closer to him.   A warm jolt jumped from the base up her spine to her heart and curled there, squeezing it tight.

"Your alarm's going off," she said.

He turned to shut it off, pulling the blanket away.  Rey pulled it back over her shoulder.  He wrapped his arm around her again.

"Good morning," he said.

"H-hi," she said.

His fingers brushed against her hairline, below her ear and kissed there.

"Do you think we have enough time?" he whispered.

"Um," she said, squirming against him,  "I'm hungry."

"Mm," he confirmed.

Hux climbed out of bed.  Rey had pulled his pajama shirt on in the night but had not buttoned it, and he his pajama bottoms.  He rummaged in his satchel for clothes and Rey did a double-take when he pulled his pajama pants down right there.  A white ass and a trail of bright red body hair from his navel down.  Whatever feeling constricted her chest squeezed tighter.

"They should have the baths open earlier," he said, pulling his underwear on.  He caught her looking at him but continued dressing.  "I could use a shower before breakfast."

"Oh.  Yeah."

"I thought I saw a co-ed bathing room."

"I think you have to reserve it," Rey said.

"We could."

"Yeah," said Rey.

He didn't have anything more to say.  Rey stepped out of bed.  He didn't steal any looks while she got dressed.

 

* * *

 

 

Hux opened the door and they were greeted with almost a foot of snow piled up against the door.  Hux peered out into the morning light.  Like Rey, the gravel road had been plowed in the night.  The car, however, had not been dug out.

"Damn," Hux said.

"Oh, God.  Do we need the snow shoes?"

Hux contemplated the snowshoes on the wall miserably.  "... I think it'll be fine if we can get to the road.  But we need to dig the doorway out."

"Why?"

He pointed at the sheer edge of the snow where it had been leaning against the door.  "If it collapses inward we won't be able to close the door behind us."

"Oh."

Hux retrieved the small shovel used to maintain the inside of their little wood-burning stove, waving Rey off as she tried to help with her gloved hands.  "It's faster if I'm not trying to avoid you."

He worked very quickly.  The man had dug a hole or two in his lifetime.

"How'd you, uh, get the thing on your side?" Rey asked.

"Hm?  Oh.  I had appendicitis."

"That's why you had to go?"

He stopped mid-shovel.  "Poe told you?"

"Uh.  Yeah."

He pursed his lips and started again.  "It burst, and then I had a complication after.  They told me to take it easy.  I thought," here Hux dropped his voice a little, "'I'm fit.  I don't need six weeks off my feet.'  So after two and a half weeks I was back to running every day.  At three and a half I was back in the hospital with a very bad hernia.  We'd been going through a reduction in forces so the medical standards have been more strictly enforced lately.  After I used my leave I still needed work accommodations they couldn't promise and that was that."

Rey was overcome with curiosity.  "Accommodations?"

"Ready access to the toilet."

She winced.  "Ohhh.  Uh, you seem fine now?"

He gave her a look and said, mock-gracious,  "Thank you.  That means a lot to me."

"Are you OK to ski?"

"I've been told to take it easy and stop if anything hurts."

He looked satisfied with the progress he'd made against the of snow in their door.  He put the shovel down and stepped out to test his handiwork.

He said, "Not ba—" 

Two things happened, almost at once: a snowball smacked into his face and shattered into a fine powder, and Hux dropped to his belly in the piled up snow and collapsed a huge pile into the doorway, wedging it open.

" _Hell!_ " Hux shouted.

Poe whooped.

"You OK?" shouted Finn.

Hux scrambled through the snow, back into the cabin, knocking large clods of white powder back into the doorway as he sat, knees to chest, against the door frame.  For a moment Rey looked at him, frozen, recalling his surgery and his history.  She could not tell if his far-off look and red eyes masked pain or something worse.

After a very, very long moment, he glanced up at her and away.  He, finally, gave her a thumbs up.

"They've dug themselves a trench to lie in," he said lowly.  He pantomimed a little hill with a dip behind it.  "They're down behind a blind."

Rey nodded.  She wet her lips.  Hux grabbed one of the larger clods of snow from beside him and started packing it together.  He put it aside and started on another, making eye contact with Rey.  She knelt and grabbed herself a chunk, copying how moved his hands.

"Guys?" called Finn tentatively.

Rey raised her voice.  "I— I don't think he's moving."

"Ooo," Hux, pursing his lips and shaking his head as he packed more snowballs and piled them just inside the doorway.

"... Are you shitting me?" said Poe.

Rey and Hux stood, leaning against the door frame, a snowball in each gloved hand.  They waited for the sound of snow crunching and it came.  Hux's eyes locked on hers.

"Now?" Rey whispered.

He shook his head faintly.

The crunching was extremely close.  The boys were close.

Poe's voice waivered.  "Hux?"

By instant consensus, Rey and Hux turned the corner and hurled their snowballs.  They found their mark, sailing through the air smacking Poe in the chest and face.

"Motherf— _ow_!"

Poe hurled the snowball he had in his hand, defensively, and by sheer luck it caught Rey in the neck, startling her.  She dropped her second snowball as Hux passed his remaining one to his right hand to return fire.  Poe scrambled back, hollering at Finn as Hux's snowball got him in the back.

"Cheating!" he shouted.

"Hooyah!" bellowed Hux.

"Some SEAL will kick your ass for stealing their grunting, you squid piece of shit!" shouted Poe.

"It's too bad my _best friend_ was in the chairforce or you'd be able to help me out."

"It's too bad you were in a swim club or you might not need help."

"You're jealous we got our dicks wet."

From out of nowhere snowball zoomed past Rey's head and Finn ducked down again as Rey fired back.

"Ohoh, no," said Rey.  She gathered a few more in her left arm and started pelting the boys position, who scrambled back to their blind.  Hux pushed his hair out of his face and checked his phone for the time.

"That's enough," said Hux.

Finn called "We bought our breakfast from the gift shop last night.  We can hold out forever."

Said Hux dryly, "And you could eat it this morning?  It didn't freeze?"

There was a pause. They heard the boys murmuring.

Poe called, "You guys want to walk to breakfast?"

"No more snowballs!" shouted Rey.

"Yeah, fine," said Poe.

"Okay," said Finn.

Hux shook his head 'no' at Rey.  He pushed the snow as best he could out of the door frame with his hands so the door could close, then gathered three snowballs under one arm and one in his right. Rey took the remainder.

"Lock the door behind us?" asked Hux.

"Sure."

They both knew how this would go.  The gravity of the situation.  Out there was a hipster piece of shit and his boyfriend, and there was no way Poe was actually going to stop fighting.   Rey and Hux were going to punish them.  They were not going to make it to breakfast without snow getting down the collars of their jackets.

Hux kissed Rey like a man who would not be returning from the war and, valiantly, galloped out into the snow to meet the enemy.

 

* * *

 

 

By unspoken agreement, the four of them stopped running at the steps of the lodge.  Poe opened his jacket to shake snow out of his coat collar and shirt, while Finn bent to run his fingers over his hair to knock the snow out of his curls.

The gray clouds had lifted and, in the clear air, Rey got a better look at the mountain.  It stood on the other side of the river she and Hux had run through, across a wide, flat, snow-covered bridge.  The mountain hadn't been much to look without the snow;  when barren, it had not occurred to Rey the little brown thing was where they would be skiing.   However, all white against a jewel-blue sky, Rey was a little taken with it.   Five white trails, clear of trees, ran up its side.  A dark chair lift contrasted against the bright white.

Poe was still finding snow in his crevices.  " _Fuck_."

"You started it," said Rey.  "We finished it."

"Whatever," said Poe.  He pulled his snow pants away from his body and a sad half-melted snowball fell down his pant leg.  Finn and Hux continued up the steps.  Rey wet her lips.

"Hey, Poe?" said Rey quietly, below where Finn and Hux could hear.

"Yeah?"

"Can I talk to you?"

"Uh," he said.  Finn looked back.

"Everything alright?" asked Finn.

"Yeah, hon, I gotta ask Rey something," Poe said.

"Oh?" said Hux.  His eyebrows raised.  There was that tight feeling in her chest again.

"J-just a minute," said Rey.

Finn and Hux looked at one another, the least familiar pair of all of them.

"After you," said Hux.  Poe and Rey watched them go in.

"What's up?" he asked.

Rey stood for a minute, pressure building.  Poe looked at her with increasing concern.

Finally, the dam broke.

"I don't know what to do about Hux," she blurted out.

Poe's face sank.  "Oh.  You guys still fighting?"

"No!" she hissed.

"Huh?"

"We— we um—"

Poe put his hands up.  "Okay.  Okay.  Was it uh... I mean, there's a problem?"

"No!  I mean, yes.  Yes, there's a problem.  But it was like...."  Rey moved her hands in the air.  "Like... I feel— like, it was like, intense, and moving and— I don't actually know him, and I feel, I feel _things_ and—"

Poe looked as horrified as Rey felt and waved his hands in front of her to hush her.  "This is not my area."

"Yeah, this is _Finn's_ area.  And _I can't talk_ to Finn.  Finn would know what to do."

"You're not gonna like what I said about it," said Poe.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, you're not.  So maybe we just—"

He turned to go up the steps.  Rey stepped in front of him.

"No. Tell me.  Please."

"Huh?"

"I am _freaking out_.  Please."

"Rey—"

"Please?"

"Okay.  Fine.  You asked, though."

"Yeah."

He took a deep breath.  "Stop being crazy."

Rey looked at him blankly.  She took a breath of her own.  "Finn wouldn't say that."

"Finn's not here.  Finn's patient with stuff like this and I'm not.  I don't know what he'd say.  I just know you're being nuts.  So stop it."

"I'm— I'm— _what_?  How am I being crazy?  _You_ set me up with him!  And like this whole thing—"

Poe took her by the hands.  "Rey.  I don't mind who you sleep with.  Really.  I mean, rooming you together? My bad.  But I know from bunking with _a lot_ of other dudes— and not all of them were straight by a long shot— being stuck in a room with a hot guy doesn't mean you screw.   ** _I_** didn't put his dick in you.

Rey drew her hands back, furious.

" _You_ introduced us.  You knew he was into me."

Poe closed his eyes the way he always did when he wanted to hide that he was rolling them.  "Rey, I'm here _to propose_.  This weekend is about Finn and I.  I'm not your _godmother_ making you a match and helping you find yourself.  If you don't like him—"

"I didn't say that," she said, and then cringed at the admission.

"Look, I don't know!" said Poe, gesticulating.  "I don't know.  And I can't help you figure it out right now.  Just, please do not blow this up?  Don't make it so you're crying with Finn, and Hux is drinking with me, and we're doing that _instead_ of having a nice weekend where I propose to my boyfriend?  Please? I know intimacy issues, I had intimacy issues when I was like 24 and full of come, and they are a _bitch_.  So I feel you. But just, like, keep it on a low simmer for a couple of days and _then_ blow him off, OK?"

Poe pushed past her to walk up the stairs, clearly annoyed.  Rey felt the blood drain from her face.

"Poe?" she said.

Poe, back turned, rolled his head around on his neck.  He said, "Yeah?"

"I'm gonna fuck this up.  I don't wanna fuck this up."

Poe sighed.  He waved her over to him and had her sit on the steps next to him.  Rey buried her head in his shins.  He pat her on the head like a labrador.

"Give yourself a little credit?" he said.

"You don't."

"Well, give yourself more than I give you, OK?  I'm kind of a dick.  And maybe give him more credit, too.  If you're into him or not into him— I'm still not super clear— a-and you don't need to say— like, he's an adult.  You're adults.  You got this."

They heard the door open.  Hux leaned out.  "Are you both all right?"

"Yeah, man," said Poe.  "Just... talking out the, uh, thing later.  Conspiring on the best time."

Hux raised his eyebrows.  "Anything I can do to help?"

He looked at Rey and clearly did not mistake her red eyes and wet nose for the cold.  

Rey said, quickly, "I'm fine.  I'm just a sucker for this kind of thing."

The corners of Hux's mouth moved, down again, a suppressed smile.  "Oh," he said.  He contemplated Rey the secret hopeless romantic.  The thought  shifted from foot to foot, cold and suddenly full of a nervous energy.

"Excuse me," Hux said and ducked back inside.

Poe and Rey watched the closed door.

"... _Fuck_ ," said Rey.

"Well," said Poe.  "Shit.  That's— he's got it bad, huh?"

" _Fuck_."

"Fuck," agreed Poe.  "Just be cool, man.  Just... try to be cool."

 

* * *

 

Rey repeated a mantra all through breakfast:

_I am cool.  Not crazy.  Cool is the opposite of crazy.  I am_ **_so_ ** _cool._

"How is yours?" asked Hux.

"Hm?"

He pointed at her quiche with his fork.

"It's cool," she said, cooly.

He gave her a polite, uncomprehending frown.

Finn took a sip of his water, shaking his head. "I don't know why you'd do eggs like this."

Poe started, "Quiche—"

Finn shut him down, "I know what quiche is, I just don't know why you'd waste eggs on it.  They're dry and bland."

"Tough words from my man Finn.  Hux?" asked Poe.

"Yes?"

"Like it?"

Hux shrugged, picking a mushroom out of the pie filling and eating it.  "I'll eat anything."

Finn's face broke out into a grin.  His eyes moved between the pie, Rey, and Hux, clearly working on some perverse pie-based innuendo.  

Rey cut him off.  "What's on the agenda today?"

Hux's hand brushed hers under the table.  "I could use a bath," he said.

"After the bath," said Rey quickly.  His fingers ran down the back of her knuckles, down to her fingertips and back up.

Rey's cheeks turned red as her body betrayed her.  Uncool.  She froze, needing to squirm and unable to.

"We can rent skis at the front desk after," said Finn.  "We asked at the front desk.  They're starting the lift back up soon."

Poe said,  "Really?"  He turned to Rey to say something.

Rey's entire attention was occupied as Hux's finger traced down the webbing between her thumb and palm, and down around the knuckle. 

Poe glanced at Hux and, gathering something was up under the table, turned to Finn to distract him so he wouldn't coo over it.  It was good thinking.  If Finn had pointed out Rey's blushing she might have exploded.

Hux noticed.  He took her hand and kissed the back of it as he stood.  "I'll go make that reservation for the bath," he said.

"Uh huh," muttered Rey.

As Hux wandered off and as Rey was tempted to start panicking, Poe caught Rey's eye.

"I'm _so_ cool," she said to Poe to reassure him.  Her voice squeaked, which undid the effect a little.

Poe put his head in his hands.  

Finn looked from Rey to Poe. "Did I miss something?"


	7. Chapter 7

Hux returned and told her they had an appointment at nine for the shared bath, and he'd booked an hour and a half.  That gave them ten minutes to stew awkwardly before it was time to go.  He looked subtly pleased with himself.  Rey turned red.

"Did it cost anything?" asked Poe.

"Not much," replied Hux.

"O-oh?" said Rey.  "How much do I owe—"

"Don't worry about it," he said.

"I'm glad we don't have to do that," said Poe.

"Do what?" asked Rey.

"Pay money to bathe with my boyfriend."

The word _boyfriend_ rattled in Rey's skull.   _Boyfriend_.   _Boyfriend_.

 _Boyfriend_.

Rey wondered how fucking old she was, that the word grabbed her so hard.  Middle school girls were all flustered by it, and Rey more than a decade later wasn't any better.  She wondered if it was because he was tall.  Rey'd always been a sucker for tall.

The orgasms could not have helped.  She cursed herself.

"It has the additional benefit of being private," said Hux.

"Does it?" said Finn, grinning.

Rey asked, "How many people would they let in?"

Hux shifted and said, "I was told up to ten.  I guess for parties or something.  However...." 

He clearly did not want the additional company but was too polite to explicitly un-invite Finn and Poe.  Hux glanced at Finn for rescue, and Rey at Poe for her own rescue. 

Finn spoke first.  "Poe and I should book it for tomorrow."

So it was settled.  They all sat in silence Finn and Hux seemed to find comfortable, oblivious.  Hux’s alarm went off.

“Hm?” said Rey.

Hux switched it off.  “Just so I would keep track of time.  We’ll see you on the mountain after?”

“Yeah,” said Poe.

He stood.  Rey stood because he stood.  Poe’s eyes flicked toward the ceiling and Rey pretended not to see.  Hux walked slowly, and as they hit the hall toward the stairway he slowed to walk next to her.

“I may have been overenthusiastic,” he said.

“Hm?”

“I was taken with the idea.  But perhaps you’d rather have some time alone?”

Rey felt herself color.  He could tell.  He knew.  He could see right through her.  She wasn't cool and he knew it.

Rey said, “No, it’s fine.”

Hux stopped.  “Fine?” he said.  He looked at her face trying to catch her eye as she avoided his gaze.

“I mean, I would like to,” she said.  She glanced up at his face, but could not do that for long.

“…Are you all right?”

Rey pressed her lips together, swearing internally.

“I’m just feeling shy,” she said.

“… Oh?”  Hux sounded completely unconvinced.

“Yeah.”

He thought about it.  Rey kept her face still through her annoyance.  Shyness was totally plausible.  It wasn’t that far from the truth.  Rey wondered what kind of asshole was skeptical of her perfectly plausible bullshit.

“… All right,” he said.

Rey blinked in surprise.  “Hm?”

“I don’t want to be late.  Just… let me know if you change your mind,” he said.  "I don't want to pressure you."

“Okay.”

They started walking again.  Hux, at the stairs, placed his palm tentatively on the small of her back, then drew it away when he heard her breath catch.

 

* * *

 

 

The front desk person escorted them into the room, carrying a pile of towels for Rey and Hux.  Unlike the single-sex bathroom which had a locker and shower room before the bath, the door opened straight into the main bathroom.  A small shower stood in the corner.  The walls were wood paneled.  The hostess placed her armful of towels on the shelf while Hux and Rey gawked at the large green stone tile bath.  There was a bench and a few cubbies next to the showers.  The hostess indicated them with a lazy wave.

“Your clothes can go here.  Shower before you get in the bath, please,” said the hostess. “The water does cycle out, but slowly.  You’ll get a chime and a flick of the lights when you have fifteen minutes left, and two when you have five.”

She pulled aside a curtain on the wood-paneled wall.  There was a small padded table with a fitted sheet over it, perhaps half as wide as a twin bed.  

The hostess said, “The bath is hot, so if you need to lie down you can do that here.”

It was a polite fiction, and one the young hostess delivered with impressive indifference.  Hux’s ears turned red.  The hostess walked out without saying anything else.

Hux and Rey looked at one another.  They were still in snow pants and unzipped jackets.  Hux’s chest moved under his green waffle knit shirt.

He looked away suddenly and shed his jacket, folding it and pushing it into a cubby hole, then shed his snow pants.  He’d worn a fine knit pair of trousers that occupied some unneeded genre between longjohns and slacks.  Rey saw the contour of his backside and turned away, shedding her own jacket to mask her reaction.

“Are you sure about this?” he said.

“Yes,” said Rey, unthinkingly contradicting.

She heard him pause, and then a rustling of fabric.  Rey stopped to catch her breath for a minute.  She saw him place his folded clothes out of the corner of his eye and heard the shower knob squeak.

Rey pulled her shirt over her head.  She made a show of being slow to fold it, then looked over her shoulder to see if Hux was watching.  He was not.  Hux was pumping soap into his hands and running it over his hands and arms, then up onto his muscular chest.  It was hard not to look at his backside.  Rey failed utterly.  Her eyes darted there and then up again.

He turned, looking over his shoulder, looking her up and down as if she were naked and not he.

“It’s very warm in here,” he said.  He pumped more soap in his hand and rubbed it over his face, on his stubbly cheeks and up over his brow.

Rey took his temporary blindness as an opportunity to divest herself of clothes without being watched.  She scrambled out of them like a mad and shoved them quick into the cubby hole while Hux rinsed off his face.  By the time he opened his eyes, Rey was approaching him, arms crossed over her chest.  He looked for her, found her and feigned surprise, turning toward her.  Rey stopped walking toward him and looked away, at the floor.

Hux stood under the water and Rey a few feet away.  It felt like a long time.  Hux crossed his arms over his nipples.

“Does this mean I’m not naked?” he asked.  She glanced at him, completely failing not to look at his genitals before seeing how he’d copied her stance.  One corner of Rey’s mouth turned up.  She fought hard not to give him the other corner.

“I usually don’t find shy women cute,” he said.  “I’ll have to make an exception.”

Rey said, “Oh, who cares?”  She dropped her arms, suddenly peevish.  Hux’s eyes flitted down to her breasts and back up.

“Hm?”

“I mean, who cares if some man likes it?  I didn’t think ‘I wonder if Armie will find this hot.’”

His head cocked to the side a little, arms still tucked under his armpits.  “Okay,” he said.

He turned back toward the faucet and finished washing himself.  It did not take long.  He soaped up his entire body quickly, efficiently and rinsed off.  Once he was finished he shut the water off, walked to the bath, and slipped into it.

Rey took her shower.  She looked behind her to see if he watched.  He did not.  His head rested against the side of the tub, eyes closed.  They only flitted open when Rey turned off the faucet.

She swallowed.   It was a long ten steps to the tub, and Hux’s shoulders and arms draped across the lip of the tub wide, open, big.  There was enough room for ten people and he filled it all by himself.  Rey could only be a guest in his tub.  He peered up at her as she knelt near him.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“We say that a lot,” he replied.

“I mean—“ she said.  She stopped herself.

“It’s all right,” he said.  He gave her a very mechanical smile.  “We had a nice time. I hope we’ll be friends.”

“Oh,” she said.  It was like being punched in the chest.  Her mouth hung open. “If— OK.  If you want.”

Hux turned toward her, frowning.

"What?"

"I mean, I get it."

He looked deeply confused. He said, “What do you want?”

It was an awful question and Rey flinched at it.  Three decades of future landed on her diaphragm, heavy as bricks. Hers to decide right then to take on or throw away. Rey covered her face.

“Aw, fuck,” she said.

“What?”

“I promised myself I’d be cool.”

“Uh huh,” he said, brow furrowed.

Rey blew air between her fingers, crouched down beside him, ass on her heels and knees mercifully shut.  Hux slid out of the tub next to her.  His hands hovered over her shoulders, and she tensed in anticipation.  He stopped.

“May I touch you?” he asked.

Rey took a deep breath and nodded.  Hux tipped her over onto his lap.  He ran his hand over her back, long firm strokes, unsexy as possible.  Rey felt like a mess.  She had a limp cock against her ribs and was sweating against his thighs.  Her muscles started to relax a little.

“There we go,” he said, businesslike.

Rey was mortified.  She said, deflecting, “Ever have to do this in the Navy?”

“You’d be surprised.”

Rey turned, unpeeling off his thighs so she could turn over to look him in the face.  “What, really?”

“It was a joke.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not true.”

He rolled his eyes.  “When I was twenty-four I led a handful of men who were maybe a year out of high school."

"Sounds fucking terrible."

Hux's head moved subtly in reluctant assent. "I hadn’t really seen a woman in eight months.  I mean, I’d seen a few, but from—”  he pointed off in the distance.  “And my Arabic and Kurdish are very poor. ‘Put down your weapon’ isn’t something you can say romantically in any language.  You get very stressed.  Feel very isolated.”

“It must be really hard not to fuck something.  Poor boys.”

He laughed.  “You women get to touch people.  You just get to sit with other women and _touch_ each other.”  He ran his palm over her hairline.

“Yeah, me and all my lady friends are having pillow fights.”

“Sounds like secret woman business.  Anyway, I’m not a big man for the Navy.  So you get these big guys far from home, and they make comments about how pretty you are to give you shit.  One tried to pull me on his lap. I had to put a stop to that immediately because I am— was— an officer.  Not appropriate.  I saw it a few times as a joke.  It wasn’t really my job to step in.  But you see other things, and you realize people deal with being isolated very differently.”

Rey made a face.  She wasn’t sure why he was telling her this.

He continued, “You have to understand, people who aren’t doing well often have a drive to be touched.  Young men especially don’t know that’s what they’re looking for.  They confuse it with sex or get frustrated.  There’s—I stress occasional— horseplay that was just loneliness. I had to keep an eye on it.  Encourage positive things like congratulatory handshakes.  My point is people go a bit nuts without human contact.”

“This is the most charming story of workplace sexual harassment I’ve ever heard.”

He pinched her ribs.  “ _You_ don’t listen.”

“I do.”

“No.”

“You talk too much,” she teased.

“No. No, no no.”  He pinched her several more times until her legs started kicking and she rolled off of his knees and into the bath.  Rey came up gasping.  He looked down at her sardonically.  Rey splashed him.  He squinted at her one-eyed.

“You’re making a mess,” he said.

“Whatever, captain.”

“Lieutenant commander,” he corrected.

She dropped her voice an octave.  “Lieutenant commander.”

He scrunched his face at her, folding his legs out under him and dangling them in the bath.  “No?” she said.

“Please no,” he said.  “My commanding officers and people under me called me that, and….”  He cringed a little.

“I _have_ been under you.  _Lieutenant commander_.”

Hux dropped into the water.  Rey moved away from him, bouncing backward in the water on her heel.

“How can I persuade you not to call me that?” he said.

“What _should_ I call you?  Pumpkin?  Armie?”  Rey swished the water back and forth, twisting this way and that like a naughty child.  She ran her hands through the water to make waves, just short of splashing.

He said, “I’m not going to chase you.  You can be annoying over there, or….”

“Or what?”

He shrugged.  “Sit on the edge of the bath.”

“And what?”

“We’ll figure it out.”

He was very casual about it like it hardly meant anything.  Just sit on the edge of the bath.  Maybe they'd play checkers.

He was in the water and it obscured below his waist.  Maybe the way his skin colored on his chest and neck in fast-blooming blotches was just the heat.  Rey felt her heart beat in her chest, slow and deep.  

Casually, as if she’d thought of it herself, she took a few steps back and pulled herself out of the water.  She sat like a real lady, buck naked, hands perched on her tightly clenched knees.  She looked down at him, mock-imperious so she wouldn't look terrified.  She watched him wade across the bath to her.

“Yes?” she said as he stood in front of her, looking up from in the water.  

He pushed the hair out of his face. His wet lashes cling together into little pale points.  His lips were very pink and his chest as well.  

His eyes lingered openly on her dark nipples and then traveled up to her shoulders, down her arms to where her fingers sat on the crest of her knee.

Hux bent and kissed the back of her right knee.  His nose rested there a moment.  His lips and cheek did not leave contact with her skin as he moved it across her, to the left knee.  He kissed that as well.

He said, “I know you don’t… enjoy it as much as other things.  But do you dislike it?”

Rey swallowed.  “Um,” she said.  

Hux’s hands ran up the sides of Rey’s calves and down again.   His head rested on her knees, but his hands explored.  As they moved up past her knees, his touch became feather light.  They moved halfway up, then down again.  She felt him knock droplets of water together, and they ran down the side of her thigh in rivulets.

Rey remembered to breathe.

Rey made a decision.  Willing herself to relax, she slowly parted her knees.  Hux lifted his head and looked.  Rey glanced down for his reaction.  She heard him exhale.  His fingers ran down the sides of her thighs, slowly around the knee and then up the tender flesh between her thighs, but stopped short before moving back down again.  He blinked slowly.

“Everything… in order?” she asked.  

He glanced up at her face, a quick smile passing over his own.  His hands moved up again, this time over the tops of her thighs and running up the skin of her stomach.  Rey felt herself arching into his touch as it moved down again.  She shut her eyes. and exhaled.

“Fuck,” she said.  

She heard him chuff, self-satisfied, then felt his breath on the inside of her knee.  He pressed the outside with his hand and kissed it firmly, and then the other, and then another higher up.  Rey felt weak.  She leaned backward onto her palms.

It was difficult to bear.  Rey looked at the ceiling.  Each new kiss was predictable, symmetrical.  He paid homage to the curves and freckles there on his pilgrimage.  Rey had a little red spot she did not like three-quarters of the way up her thigh.  She did not have to look to know exactly where it was and she gasped when he kissed there.  He dragged his tongue across it.   He blessed the same spot on the other thigh as well.

It was personal.  Each freckle he kissed that was just hers, only hers, told her exactly who he meant to kiss.

And then he pressed his lips against her lower ones, firm and closed mouthed.  She shuddered.  He pulled away, and all she could feel was his breath.  His hands rested on her thighs, fingers at the outer curve of her buttocks.  Rey, feeling a stab of trepidation, looked down.

With his eyes on hers, he drug his lip across her skin, gently licking her folds.  Rey’s thighs tensed involuntarily.

“Oh, Jesus,” she breathed. 

His fingers dug into her thighs and he licked her, flat-tongued and luxurious.  His lips were firm and full against hers.  By chance, the next stroke of his tongue brushed against the tip of her clitoris on the way up, and she hissed.

His tongue drove Rey crazy.  It was both not enough pressure and too much at that one specific spot.  Rey’s wetness coated her thighs and as her arousal grew so did her frustration.  She squirmed under him.  She shook her head.

“I— I can’t—“ she panted.

He pulled away.  His eyes were hooded, drugged, and his mouth was slick.  He looked up at her.

“I need more pressure,” she said.  He bent to try again.  Rey’s fingers played at his hairline as she shook her head.

Hux’s fingers ran around the inside of Rey’s thighs.  He watched Rey’s reaction as he, poised two fingers at her entrance.  Rey winced.

“That— it might not—“

“Shh,” he said.  

He slipped his fingers slowly inside of her.  Rey felt herself clench around them.  He turned them upward, to beckon, slowly moving them inside of her.  Rey reached down.

“I need the, the outside too,” she panted.  He brushed her fingers aside with his left hand and, gently at first, pressed the heel of his palm against her clitoris.

Rey’s mouth opened.  He increased the pressure slowly, moving her in firm, quick up and down motions as he fucked her with his fingers.  Rey’s hips rocked against him.  She clapped her hand over her mouth.  The pleasure drew her voice out of her in spastic bursts.

“Like that?” he said.

“Oh my God, yes,” she said.  “Oh my fucking— oh— oh!”

He did not stop moving when she clenched around his fingers.  It seemed to go on and on.  Her hips bucked and the heel of his palm, suddenly very slick, slid against her.  He waited for her to stop shaking before pulling his fingers out.  It was still too soon.  A little sigh of protest escaped her.

Rey leaned back and grabbed the air where she knew he could see it.

“Come here,” she panted.  Instead, he moved away from her.  She heard him splash out of the water and turned her head.  He was sitting against the wall, cross-legged.

“You’re not going to make me ride you after that?” she asked.

Hux nodded.  “I want to see your face,” he said.

Rey rolled up onto her knees, and, seeing his face, liked it.  His lips parted seeing her like that.  Rey crawled to him, enjoying how his eyes watched her breasts sway, how he’d look back at her eyes.  His right hand rested on his thigh.  He was patient, but not very.  His fingers couldn’t help but rest at the base of him.  He breathed in anticipation, so Rey drew it out.  She took each crawling step forward slow as she could, letting the water drip down her back and mix with the wetness between her thighs.  He reached for her and passed his palm over her face as she was close to him.

She looked at his face.  He ached.  God, he ached.  She’d never seen a man ache like that.

Rather than make him wait, rather than teasing him, Rey looked up in his eyes and kissed him, on the underside of his cock.  His stomach muscles tensed.  Rey couldn’t resist licking the seam that split him, that raised scar where all men were knit together.  She dragged her tongue up the underside of his cock.  Because he shuddered so pleasantly she kissed the tip, pulled it in-between her lips.

Hux sighed.  His hands stroked her hair at the temples.  It made the hairs on her head stand up, the way he touched her.  She wrapped her fingers around the base of his cock and passed her tongue firmly across the bottom of his cock as she took as much as she could into her mouth.  She let him rest against the back of her throat, passive, until she needed to breathe.  She drew back, inhaled, and went back down, moving only her tongue gently on the underside of him.  His fingers twitched.  He drummed one against her temple.  Rey pulled back and looked up at him, running her hand up and down his cock while she caught her breath.

“Is-is it good?” she asked.

He nodded spastically.  “But come here.”  He patted his thigh.

He wanted her on top of him.  Rey climbed onto his lap and he pulled her down on top of him.  Rey gasped.  He grit his teeth, tensing to keep himself still.

“Fuck, I’m close,” he said.

“It’s OK,” she said.  She tried to draw up to ride him, but he held her hips steady.  He shook his head, eyes clenched.

“Just a minute longer.  Just a minute.”

“It’s OK.”

“I want to look at your face,” he said, eyes still closed.  “Just for a minute.”

Rey was still while he composed himself.  He opened his eyes.  Eventually, they cooperated with him and focused on her.  He exhaled.

“Oh,” he said.  He reached his hands up, tentative, as if they’d never kissed and he was afraid she might not want to.  He pecked her, once, twice on the mouth, looking into her eyes between each one.

Rey laughed. “Hi,” she said.  

His stomach muscles under her spasmed, and he pulled her into a firm, full, open-mouthed kiss, arms wrapped tight around her waist.

Rey rode him. He came after only a few short strokes.  His voice echoed into Rey’s open mouth as he held her waist hard as he could to him, pressing his cock against his back wall like fingers pushing hard into a deep bruise.  Rey arched against him in discomfort and a little pleasure at it.

Rey let him hold her for a while.  Too soon the first chime rang.  It was almost time to go.  Rey sighed.

“Why is the bath the only warm place here?”

He kissed her cheek.  “I bet it’s your fault.”

“My fault?”

“Mm-hm.”

“How is it my fault?”

“It’s fun to blame you.  That must be for a reason.”

Rey scrunched her face at him.  He looked from her eyes to her lips and gave her a peck.

Rey said, “If we don’t shower, we’ll be very dirty from our bath.”

“I like how you say that,” he said.

“You can’t be ready again.”

“I’m just saying.  For the future.”

Rey swallowed.  “Future?”

His eyebrows knit together, not worried for himself at all.  “Of course.  Next time.”

“Right,” Rey said quickly.

He gave her a quick, sly smile then pecked her on the nose.  “Let’s get in the shower.”

Rey dismounted him, wincing as he slipped out.  She hobbled over to the shower.  Hux unfolded himself, his gait also uncharacteristically ungraceful.

“I think I’m officially sore,” said Rey.  “Not sure how ski lessons will go.”

“You don’t know how?”

“Of course not.  I didn’t see snow until yesterday.”

“I knew that,” he said ruefully.  He thought.  “You might be tired of me, but I’d be happy to teach you.  I might have to beg off after an hour.”

“Sounds good to me.”

They took turns soaping up while the other rinsed off in the shower.  He’d steal quick kisses as they traded places.

Rey felt, strangely, fine.  Good, in fact.  The come-dumb euphoria still buzzed through her veins and crackled in her nerves.

She wondered if it would last.


End file.
